Patel, Rayudu in post-match verbal war

As Mumbai Indians’ Kieron Pollard struck a powerful boundary to deep mid-wicket off Chris Gayle to seal the match in favour of his team, man of the match Ambati Rayudu, who was on the other end, pumped his fist in delight.

Rayudu stopped after taking two steps towards the sight-screen and celebrated animatedly, but he did so facing Royal Challengers Bangalore’s pacer Harshal Patel, and his ecstatic celebration seemed to have hit a wrong chord with Harshal, who was walking towards the pitch to shake hands with players, and the paceman reacted by charging towards Rayudu.

Seeing this, Rayudu too started walking towards Harshal but by then players from either teams managed to pull them apart. Stand-in skipper Virat Kohli, who came to pacify the situation, himself got into a duel with Rayudu in the process, forcing their team-mates to separate them.

“I wouldn’t like to comment about that. At the end of the day, it could have been a rush of blood but it didn’t look good,” said Kohli during the post-match press conference here on Monday.

“I went up to the umpire and told him that he (Rayudu) had absolutely no reason to go up to a player after winning the match. He should have gone to the dugout and celebrated with his team-mates, rather than going up to a player and saying things to his face,” remarked the India batsman.

“That’s what I told the umpire and that’s what I was trying to tell Rayudu. I was trying to tell him to calm down and trying to get the two together, but it was getting heated up at that time.”

Pollard too played down the issue. “I hit the ball to mid-wicket and I was looking at the ball,” said the West Indian.“So I didn’t see what happened. That was part of cricket obviously, though it looked a bit ugly. But at the end of the day, emotions run high. There are quite a few teams fighting it out for the play-off spots and it is crowded table. You get these sort of things in these sort of games. It is all done and dusted,” he said.