Five of the ugliest fights in IPL history
In yesterday's IPL match, Harshal Patel of Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) got into a spat with Rajasthan Royal’s Riyan Parag. The incident happened after Parag scored 18 runs off Patel's over. Parag hit two huge sixes and a boundary in the last over of the innings to take his team to a total of 144/8.
But, after the over, the two got into a fight while they were leaving the ground. First, Parag had some verbal exchanges with Mohammad Siraj, and later on Patel too stepped in. Players from both teams pacified the two.
After the match got over and RCB lost to Rajasthan, Harshal refused to shake hands with Parag.
In IPL's history, there have been several instances where players have had confrontations during the matches. Here are five such incidents:
KIERON POLLARD VS MITCHELL STARC (2014)
This one is argubaly the worst fight in IPL ever. Pollard showing his boots to Starc and Starc showing his middle finger to the Caribbean. It was the 17th over of the match when Starc bowled a bouncer to Pollard, which the West Indies batter couldn’t play.
Starc then walked up to him and said something, which led to Pollard making a gesture with his hand. Then, on the next delivery, Starc was about to release the ball when Pollard decided not to face the ball. Starc threw the ball at the batter, which angered Pollard. The West Indian charged his bat as if he was going to throw it on Starc. The bat slipped from his hand landed on the pitch.
On the next ball, Starc runs out Pollard with West Indian batter not even running to the other side and instead showing his boots. After the match, both the players were penalized for their behaviour. Starc was fined 50% of his match fee, while Pollard was fined 75%.
GAUTAM GAMBHIR VS VIRAT KOHLI (2013)
In 2013, two hot-headed players went up against each other. In the 17th over of the game, when Kohli was dismissed by Laksmipathy Balaji, he got into a heated exchange with KKR captain Gautam Gambhir. Kohli and Gambhir were seen angrily walking against each other only to be then separated by other players including and umpires. The two patched up after the match and didn’t speak anything about it to the media.
HARBHAJAN SINGH AND SREESANTH SAGA (2008)
During the first season of the IPL in 2008, Mumbai Indians had lost a match against Kings XI Punjab. After the game, Harbhajan Singh slapped S Sreesanth. There are diffrent theories to what exactly happened between them. After the incident, a video of Sreesanth crying went viral on social media. Harbhajan later apologised to Sreesanth.
MS DHONI LOSES COOL (2019)
Rarely does it happen that Mahendra Singh Dhoni loses his cool. But in 2019, during a match against Rajsthan Royals, Captain Cool lost it and entered the ground to confront the umpires.
It all happened when the match about to end and CSK needed 8 runs off 3 balls. Ben Stokes bowled a high-pitched full toss to a CSK player, which the main umpire called as No Ball, but the third umpire didn’t signal anything. Confusion erupted and eventually the delivery was given a green signal by both the umpires. This enraged Dhoni, who entered the field to have a word with the umpires. CSK, however, won the match.
KIERON POLLARD VS DWAYNE BRAVO (2012)
During the fifth edition of IPL, Kieron Pollard and Dwayne Bravo had a fight. It was the eliminator match between Chennai Super Kings (CSK) and Mumbai Indians (MI). CSK had posted a total of 187 runs.
Mumbai’s batting collapsed while chasing the target. They were down to 129/7 and needed 59 runs off 13 balls. Pollard was batting and Bravo bowled a bouncer. Pollard mistimed it and the ball landed into the hands of Suresh Raina.
Bravo teased Pollard by showing him a send-off gesture. Pollard looked angry all through and didn’t say anything.