The die-hard fans of the Indian Premier League have been left surprised by the latest spat between Virat Kohli and Gautam Gambhir during the running season of the tournament.
According to the report, it was nothing but the upshot of an old issue between the Kolkata Night Riders skipper Gautam Gambhir and the captain of the Royal Challengers Bangalore Virat Kohli that resulted into a clash between the two at the Chinnaswamy Stadium on 11th April, 2013.
It was, in fact, a strong verbal fight between the two cricketers that just got out of control right after the first ball of the 10th over delivered by Lakshmipathy Balaji. Kohli, the right-handed player who had already hit the left-arm fast-medium pacer Pradeep Sangwan of KKR for two sixes, went for a wild slash but could not be successful. He was easily caught out in the sweeper cover region.
Soon after that, the KKR captain Gambhir and his other teammates headed for the cover region in order to rejoice the dismissal. At that moment, Kohli also walked towards the cover region rather than going back to the pavilion, and he was seen to make a remark too. It was a trigger for Gambhir. He also started approaching Kohli furiously. However, the situation could not get worse as Rajat Bhatia, the KKR all-rounder, get in between the two stars and made an effort to take control over the circumstance by calming Gambhir down.
Right after the incident, both Kohli and Gambhir have been cautioned and castigated for violating the code of conduct of the Indian Premier League. They have already made a clean breast to the Match Referee about the Level 1 offence, which refers to the usage of words as well as gestures that are obscene, odious or abusive at some stage in the match.
The ‘old issue’ that experts are assuming to be the reason lying behind the angry demeanour of these two Indian teammates is still not clear. However, experts are saying that it is not at all a simple ‘heat-of-the-moment’ incident. However, both Virat Kohli and Gautam Gambhir played it safe by belittling the entire occurrence at the presentation ceremony and behaving quite in a normal way.
When Gambhir was asked about the fact, he simply downplayed it by saying, “Some things happen in the heat of the moment…it’s nothing”. On the other hand, Kohli tactfully managed the media with his statement, “what’s done on the field is done”.
Nevertheless, how much both of them try to shrug off the ugly on-field spat, it can easily be said that certain old issues have re-emerged, and the ice between the captain of Kolkata Knight Riders and his Royal Challengers Bangalore counterpart is yet to melt.