Tempers flared on Monday night at the Ekana Stadium when Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) star batter Virat Kohli got involved in a heated exchange with Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) mentor Gautam Gambhir and bowler Naveen-ul-Hq. The post-match scenes were not at all friendly and the BCCI had to take strict actions, imposing strict fines on all three of them.
But this wasn’t the first time when Gautam Gambhir was involved in a heated verbal exchange with a player from the opposition. His rivalry with Kohli in the IPL dates back to 2013 when Gambhir was leading the Kolkata Knight Riders. That’s one of the red-hot incidents that people know about. But very few people are aware that Gambhir once tried mocking MS Dhoni as well.
The incident was narrated by former India all-rounder Irfan Pathan while commentating in the LSG vs Chennai Super Kings (CSK) cash on Wednesday. He recalled an incident from 2016 when CSK was banned from the tournament and Dhoni was leading the Rising Pune Supergiants (RPS).
In a match between KKR and RPS, Dhoni walked in to bat when his team was reduced to 74/4. Gambhir, who was leading KKR then, went all in to surround Dhoni with fielders. He called in the likes of Shakib Al Hasan, Suryakumar Yadav, and Yusuf Pathan in close-in positions, giving Dhoni no room to breathe
“Dhoni would find it hard to find his way against the spinners. He tried to defend or block, he looked extremely vulnerable. And this Gambhir knew well and also how to used it to his benefit,” Irfan recalled.
“Gautam Gambhir played with the ego of MS Dhoni when he was the captain of KKR. He was the only one who succeeded in rattling him for years,” he said. “MS was rattled to the core by the field setting,” he added.
IPL has been pitting some of the finest players of the game against each other since its inception and such moments serve as a heavy dosage of entertainment to the viewers. Both Dhoni and Gambhir were the architects of India’s 2-11 World Cup victory but have always been rivals in the IPL. Several reports have claimed rift between the two Indian stalwarts but Gambhir has openly said that nothing is wring between them and in fact, praised the former Indian captain for his excellence.
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