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Chennai, April 10: AB de Villiers has three hundreds in the IPL, fifth in the list of century makers in the tournament. But beyond that, De Villiers has played several mini classics to save the day for Royal Challengers Bangalore. The South African maestro dished out one on the first day of the IPL 2021, this time against the Mumbai Indians at the MA Chidambaram Stadium on Friday (April 9).
When Dan Christian was out in the 17th over (16.3 overs to be precise), Royal Challengers were 122 for 6 and 38 runs shy of the target. At that juncture, De Villiers was batting on 19 off 14 balls. In the next 13 balls, he produced 28 runs.
It was not just blind hitting, but more of calculated nature. Trent Boult was creamed for a six and four. The four was a remarkable shot, finding the gap between long-on and long-off while drilling the ball past the stumps.
Bumrah was taken care of in similar fashion - two fours. The Indian pacer missed the yorker marginally and De Villiers carved the ball over extra-cover, and then he late cut a short-pitched ball that climbed on to his body over short third man for another boundary. When a genius in flow, it is hard to stop.
Once Bumrah and Boult was taken out of equation, the Mumbai Indians did not have enough ammunition to stop RCB. The run out of De Villiers added some artificial excitement but on the night his effort was not to be consigned to the bin.
De Villiers said beating defending and five-time champions Mumbai gave the team a lot of confidence. "There's a reason why Mumbai have won this trophy five times. There's a lot of aura around them. But that was the challenge, to beat the champions and it gives you a lot of confidence. We did well tonight," said De Villiers to the host broadcaster after the two-wicket win.
"It was an incredible game of cricket, always seems to be against Mumbai. We came in knowing it wasn't going to be easy. I knew halfway it was going to get tough, it's one of those pitches that gets harder as the game goes on. They have a wonderful bowling line-up that put us under pressure," he said.
On his run out, AB said: "There was an easy two in my opinion, but as I started it felt like I was running backwards. Krunal got it spot on with the throw."
De Villiers said having Glenn Maxwell and Christian in the line-up has added to the firepower of RCB. "Absolute pleasure playing alongside Maxwell. I love playing with players like him, fantastic to have someone like that to bat ahead of me and Christian behind me. We have a nice little set up."
