And yesterday, when I made a visit to MG Road to catch up with a long-time friend in a local resto-pub, I hardly realized the amount of traffic that I would have to encounter in an afternoon. Make no mistake, I have been paying a visit to that part of the city around three-four times every month and well aware of the difficulties that the Bengalureans face on a day-to-day basis due to heavy traffic that the city throws at them. However, something felt different yesterday. More than 30 hours ahead of the actual game beginning, MG Road was filled with people brimming with the enthusiasm like it always is when Royal Challengers Bangalore and Chennai Super Kings lock horns with each other. 

However, despite paying some of the highest prices in the league to attend the home games at the Chinnaswamy, Bengaluru fans also made it a point for other teams by filling the stadium season-in, season-out and what if the team doesn’t have a title to their name, they always have their 12th man to cheer for them. However, it is where Chennai Super Kings secure the brownie point. The team have two IPL titles to boast up to go with two Champions League titles, but, their archrivals have only their hopes after being weighed down by the barren first decade of the IPL. 

Deviating from the action on the 22 yards, Chennai, in fact, most parts of Tamil Nadu, are in protest mode over the Centre’s delay in forming the Cauvery Management Board for the appropriate distribution of Cauvery water between Karnataka and Tamil Nadu. Protests outside the Chidambaram Stadium in Chennai over the water-sharing issue with the neighbouring state, the notification of a management board as ordered by the Supreme Court to oversee the process all over again. Politicians and cine stars led the protests against the staging of the IPL games in Chennai and eventually, the tournament had to be shifted out. But, in the backdrop, the incident also brought another sub-plot to the glowing narrative. 

When it comes to the rivalry between these two states, people couldn’t have cared less for other matches as well. When Bengaluru FC took on Chennaiyin FC in the finals of the Indian Super League last month, the crowd was as ebullient and equally boisterous as ever. And finally, when the Abhishek Bachchan-owned franchise scampered home to win their second ISL title, they didn’t get a slight bit of applause from the Bengaluru fans. Such has been the height of rivalry between sporting teams of the two states that they just wait for their chances to come to exact revenge. 

“It is a hugely emotional moment for me that we returned after a couple of years. We waited patiently, but some fringe groups damned our homecoming. Now, we are back and will show the RCB what we are capable of this time in their own den,” Srijith Gopal, a senior marketing executive in a Bangalore and a die-hard CSK fan, told me. 

It is not only fans who added value to the rivalry rather the two teams have shared some of the best moments in the league as well. In the 2013 IPL, after making 165 at the Chepauk, RCB had Chennai on the mat with the home side needing 41 off 18 balls, and then Dhoni got out leaving CSK with 29 needed off 11 balls. With 16 needed off the last over from RP Singh, Ravindra Jadeja cracked a six and a four off the first two balls. It was CSK's match to lose, but after four runs in the next three balls, Jadeja edged the ball to the third man going for a slog off the last ball and RCB managed to win. Kohli ran in the animated way that he only can - screaming with relentless excitement - only to realise that RP Singh bowled a no-ball, and CSK won the game. 

This time, there was no jaw-dropping moments though as Murali Vijay's express 95 meant RCB had a mammoth 206 runs to chase and they were never in with a chance. Ravichandran Ashwin took out Chris Gayle on his fourth ball, and the non-existent chance vanished completely with that and CSK became the champions, once again. 

But, this year the case has been different. While RCB, once again, found themselves at the bottom half of the table with three losses from five matches, CSK is on a singular man march in every encounter and is yet to fire in unison, but managed to secure four victories of five matches. And good form can sometimes be the main reason why teams overlook their flaws as Subhayan Dutta explained why their dependence on one-two players can spring up like a volcano when CSK run out of solo performers and the management run of remedies. 

Because, the night is less about cricket, more about bragging rights. And, who says, cricket doesn’t have any domestic rivalry.