Passionate batting perfect, perhaps? (7)

I believe the answer is:

intense

'passionate' is the definition.
(thesaurus)

'batting perfect perhaps?' is the wordplay.
'batting' becomes 'in'.
'perfect perhaps?' becomes 'tense' (grammar**).
'in'+'tense'='INTENSE'

(Other definitions for intense that I've seen before include "Extreme - strong" , "Strongly felt" , "Acute, exteme" , "Extremely emotional" , "say, description of campers?" .)

I've seen this clue in The Telegraph.

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