The only upside to the latest Virat Kohli-Gautam Gambhir showdown is the reiteration of the existence of some elements of rivalry in the game that once used to be flush with bitter face-offs. The IPL has eliminated all such acrimony and the Lucknow fracas may be a reassurance that there are some who will still ensure some kind of on-field drama, even though the two protagonists are from the same country. The same city as well.

Perspective apart, as Kohli would say later, the Monday night confrontation in Lucknow was not an instant happenstance, the roots of it go back to the April 10 contest between the Royal Challengers Bangalore and Lucknow Super Giants at Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bengaluru where the latter had won off the last ball in a very dramatic ending.

RCB, with a fiercely charged up Kohli, were keen to avenge that bitter April 10 loss at home. So it was a battle within the battle and once the LSG chase — for what initially appeared as an easy target, 127 – started, Kohli was characteristically full of beans.

Those privy to the turn of events in the middle at the Bharat Ratna Shri Atal Bihari Vajpayee Ekana Cricket Stadium confided to Cricbuzz that a high-spirited Kohli had started throwing verbal volleys at the opposition batsmen from the very beginning. Even Kyle Mayers, who lasted only two balls, was not apparently spared.

It was evident that Kohli looked animated during the entire duration of the LSG chase, never afraid to show his full gamut of emotions. Naveen-ul-Haq, only 23 and relatively new to the tensions of IPL contests, had to face a few verbal volleys from the RCB talisman when the Afghan was in the middle and scored a few runs in the low-scoring chase.

When the post-match handshakes were on, Naveen swore back at Kohli and it led to an argument. Mayers tried to check with Kohli ‘amicably’ why he was getting excited but Gambhir took the West Indies batter away from the 34-year-old. The LSG explanation was that Gambhir was striving to impress upon Mayers the futility of such a soft talk once the match got over.

Evidently, Kohli did not like the Gambhir gesture and questioned him why he was getting involved when he had not even spoken to him. Gambhir’s retort was he would not keep quiet when his players were sworn at and abused constantly. It led to some heated exchanges, between Kohli and Gambhir, whose rivalry goes back to the date when the latter was still leading Kolkata Knight Riders. Those exchanges between them are part of the IPL folklore. KL Rahul, Amit Mishra and Faf du Plessis tried to douse the fire, but the cameras had captured everything.

The Gambhir camp thinks Kohli is bitter with his former India and Delhi colleague because the cricketer-turned-MP-turned-television expert has criticised his captaincy many times. There is also this incident that the two may not have forgotten when Kohli got KL Rahul included in the Indian team and eventually in the XI for a Test against England in Visakhapatnam (in 2016) when Gambhir was the designated opener for the game.

After the match on Monday, Kohli was shown screaming in ecstasy in a video posted by RCB’s official channel, “That’s a sweet win boys! Sweet win, Let’s Go!

“It was a really important win on the road. It’s a very sweet win for many reasons, most importantly for the kind of character we showed defending that total. The win was great and the fact that we got more support than the home crowd is an unbelievable feeling, it tells you all about how much we are liked as a team and how people come out and back us.”

Kohli was also spotted in that video saying, “If you can give it, you got to take it. Otherwise don’t give it.”

The former India skipper, however, strove to refute all the theories that are being spoken about the feud. “Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth,” he said in a social media ‘story.’