It may be very early days in the Indian Premier League (IPL) IX but the word from the Kolkata Knight Riders camp is that they are going gaga over this ‘Robin and the Batman’ combination. No prizes for guessing really that it’s the chemistry between their two seasoned openers: captain Gautam Gambhir and Robin Uthappa, which has evoked the comparison with the popular comic book duo.

While even a casual follower of the IPL will vouch that morning rarely shows the day in this long-winded league, the duo has been giving the two-time champions the kind of flourishing starts which made the job of chasing look embarrassingly easy so far. KKR’s three wins from four matches till date, which had put them on top of the table (as of Wednesday night), have come from batting second with the Gambhir-Uthappa duo putting up partnerships of 69, 92 and 82, respectively.

The lone blip came against Mumbai Indians, a match which the Knights lost after being sent into bat, but the refreshing feature of their stands so far had been the cricketing maturity — not to speak of the X-factor they call chemistry. It’s not surprising though, given the wealth of experience that both bring to the table combined with the advantage of playing together for three seasons now.

The other day, after chasing down a modest target against Kings XI Punjab, Uthappa had resorted to the usual niceties about a fine ‘understanding’ of each other’s game and the so-called chemistry between them as one of the key factors behind their success. There is, to my mind, another factor — an all-consuming hunger to succeed which has seen them still working on their game to make it sharper every year.

Just ponder this: Gambhir, 34, had been one of the leading openers in international cricket before being out of favour with the national selectors for nearly three years while Uthappa could never consolidate his place in the national team in any format despite his twin-capabilities of an opener and keeper. At a time in their careers when franchise cricket looks the only real deal for them, Gambhir has taken pains repeatedly to add an extra edge to his craft — a visit to Western Australia for a few sessions with Justin Langer being cited as the reason behind a more open stance this season.

Uthappa, meanwhile, has looked a different player from the 2014 IPL season itself — an year which had also seen him perform phenomenally in domestic cricket. Shedding off an underachiever’s tag in the IPL (despite often commanding high prices), the Bengaluru man showed it’s possible to play within the ‘V’ with success in this format as he scored over 600 runs to walk away with the orange cap.

It’s certainly no exaggeration to say that after three seasons, the Uthappa-Gambhir combination can certainly be rated as one of the top opening combinations in the IPL along the likes of Brendon McCullum & Dwayne Smith, Murali Vijay & Michael Hussey (both Chennai Super Kings) or Gambhir’s Old Firm stand with the inimitable Virender Sehwag for Delhi Daredevils.

Let the ‘Robin and the Batman’ show continue to prosper!