Kohli-Gambhir spat: Gavaskar feels imposing fine is not enough

Former Indian batter Sunil Gavaskar has taken a rather strict position on the fracas that made the spectacle after the Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) vs Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) match on Monday.

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At the fag end of the game RCB’s Virat Kohli exchanged a few charged words with LSG’s Afghan player Naveen-ul-Haq. Things were pacified with umpires and Amit Mishra chipping in. However, during the customary post-match handshake, Kohli and Naveen again had quite an intense confrontation, leading to a showdown between Kohli and LSG mentor Gautam Gambhir.

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The altercation hogged the headlines for a day or so and shadowed all other developments in the IPL.

Although all the three involved, Kohli, Naveen and Gambhir were fined for creating a scene, Gavaskar believes it won’t suffice. He wants an exemplary punishment that ensures it never comes to this between the players on the field.

“Well, I saw the visuals only a while ago, I did not see the match live yesterday. These things never look good. What is a 100 per cent match fee? What exactly is a 100 per cent match fee? If it is Kohli, who is on maybe ₹17 crore for RCB, which means ₹17 crore for a possible 16 matches, including the semi-finals, and finals. So you are talking about a crore of rupees. Is he going to be fined ₹1 crore and more? Well, that’s a very, very stiff fine,” Gavaskar said on Star Sports.

“I don’t know what Gambhir’s situation is. They should ensure that this is not repeated. You are hoping that this is not repeated because it’s such a stiff fine, such a stiff punishment. You want to play it hard, play it competitively. During the time that we played, there was a bit of banter, but there was none of this aggression that we see now. A lot of it has got to do with the fact that everything is on TV too. Because of the fact that you are on TV, you tend to do maybe just that little bit extra,” he added.

Calling for making not just the players but also their teams to realise the consequences he cited Harbhajan Singh and Sreesanth’s episode as an example and suggested suspending the players for a couple of games.

“So, my point, is do something which will make sure, these things don’t happen again. If it has to you know, like it happened with Harbhajan and Sreesanth 10 years ago, you have to ask them to maybe step aside for a couple of matches. Make sure you do something that ensures that these things don’t happen and also something that will hurt the team. That’s a stiff one,” he added.

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