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Manoj Tiwary opens up on his fight with Gautam Gambhir during Ranji Trophy 2015

The duo, playing for Bengal and Delhi respectively, had an ugly on-field altercation.

Mumbai: The Ranji Trophy season of 2015 was stirred as two of the veterans on the circuit, Gautam Gambhir and Manoj Tiwary, had an ugly spat on the cricket field.

While Gambhir, who in the past, had once collided with Virat Kohli during the Kolkata Knight Riders versus Royal Challengers Bangalore game in the Indian Premier League, has made up with the fellow Delhi batsman, Gambhir and Tiwary are yet to patch up.

The incident took place as Tiwary walked out to bat wearing cap. After he took guard and was about to take strike, he stopped the bowler and called for a helmet as a pacer was bowling from the other end. Delhi players thought it was a time wasting tactic from the then Bengal skipper.

Gambhir, Delhi captain, who was fielding in the slips, clearly was not amused as he had a go at Tiwary. Gambhir said, "Shaam ko mil tujhe maroonga (Meet me in the evening, I will hit you). And Tiwary retorted, saying: "Shaam kya abhi bahar chal (Why wait till evening, let's go out and settle it now").

The umpires had to intervene as both the players came close to exchanging blows. Tiwary then screamed at Gambhir, saying: "Did I tell you anything? Why did you have to come in between."

Tiwary, who once was Gambhir's teammate at Shah Rukh Khan-co-owned KKR, also had an altercation with Gambhir as the Bengal batsman played for Rising Pune Supergiant in the tenth edition of the IPL.

“People have a perception of me getting involved in such heated arguments unnecessarily. But that was not the case. These days, each and every domestic match gets recorded. Everybody can watch the video and find out what exactly happened between me and Gauti bhai. The people from the media sit inside the ground, so the voices can be heard clearly. So, everybody knows who did what on that particular afternoon,” said Tiwary in an interview to Sportstar.

While Tiwary was fined 70 per cent of his match fees, 40 per cent Gambhir's match fees were deducted. It was reported that Gambhir had spoken against former India cricket team captain Sourav Ganguly and that did not go down too well with Tiwary.

However, Tiwary said that he and Gambhir once shared a healthy relationship and he has a lot of respect for “Gauti bhai”. He also stated that a few people, who were closed to Gambhir, did not like Tiwary’s proximity with the southpaw.

“I always had great admiration and respect for Gauti bhai. May be, there were a few people around him who didn’t like my proximity to him. May be, the relationship soured because of that. I know for a fact that some people were not too happy with our bonding. May be, they could have influenced him,” said Tiwary.

Tiwary also spoke about his ouster from KKR and how he suggested Gambhir to have Sunil Narine in the KKR line-up.

“I don’t know what went wrong (and why was I released). May be, the KKR management knows better why they left me out of the team,” said Tiwary.

“I was the one who told him (Gambhir) to go for Sunil Narine. I had seen Sunil bowl to Rohit Sharma during one of India’s matches against the West Indies. I also spoke about Debabrata Das. I had told Gauti bhai to pick Debabrata in the local catchment slot though the latter had a lack of confidence,” concluded Tiwary.

( Source : deccan chronicle )
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