AB de Villiers special knock of 90* helps Royal Challengers Bangalore register a 6 wicket win over Delhi Daredevils in the 19th match of IPL at M Chinnaswamy Stadium, Bangalore. RCB captain won the toss and bowled first. Pant 85 and Iyer 52 helped Delhi post 174 for 5 in 20 overs. While chasing, AB de Villiers showed his class with a brilliant 90*, helped RCB for an easy victory.
Royal Challengers Bangalore captain Virat Kohli won the toss and elected to field first. Delhi Daredevils captain Gambhir was dismissed in the 3rd by Umesh Yadav. Jason Roy also struggled against RCB bowlers scoring just 5 runs. At end of 6 overs, Delhi Daredevils posted just 28 runs for 2 wickets.
Sheryas Iyer and Pant steadied the innings taking singles, hitting bad balls away for boundaries. Despite good bowling by Royal Challengers Bangalore bowlers, both batsmen played with good intent. Iyer reached his half-century off 29 balls. Both Iyer and Pant added 75 runs for the 3rd wicket. Iyer was dismissed by Washington Sundar for 52 runs.
Glenn Maxwell fell cheaply for 4 runs. The hard-hitting Pant took on the Royal Challengers Bangalore reaching his half-century off 34 balls. In the death overs, Pant played great shots and put RCB bowlers under immense pressure. He was dismissed in the last over for 85 runs off 48 balls. Delhi Daredevils posted 174 for 5 in 20 overs.
Chasing 175, Royal Challengers Bangalore lost an early wicket of Manan Vohra for 2 runs. Quinton de Kock and Virat Kohli put on 20 runs before de Kock was dismissed for 18 runs. At the end of 6 overs, RCB scored 43 runs.
AB de Villiers took on the Delhi Daredevils bowlers with aggressive batting. Kohli and AB de Villiers added 63 runs for a 3rd wicket. Kohli was caught brilliantly with a one-handed attempt from Trent Boult for 30 runs.
South African star de Villiers continued to smash Delhi Daredevils bowlers. He reached his half-century off 24 balls and along with Corey Anderson added 56 runs in quick time. Anderson has dismissed 15 runs. Mandeep Singh also scored quick fire 17 off 9 balls. AB de Villiers remained not out on 90 off 39 balls.
RCB 176 for 4 in 18 overs ( AB de Villiers 90*, Virat Kohli 30, Mandeep Singh 17*, Trent Boult 1/33) beat
DD 174 for 5 in 20 overs ( Pant 85, Iyer 52, Chahal 2/22) by 6 wickets.
DD captain Gambhir said: The spinners could have been better. The pitch in the first 6 overs was tricky. Iyer and Pant played brilliantly to get us a good total. AB de Villiers took their chances and dominated right from then. Hopefully, we can turn things around when we get to Delhi.
RCB captain Virat Kohli said: It was a great effort by AB de Villiers who scored 90 runs. I scored 30 runs which are bigger than the 92 I scored in the last match. The way we started in the 1st 15 overs, it was good. We need to work on some areas. Lot of positives for us and we would push ourselves hard in the coming matches.
Man of the match AB de Villiers said: Today’s knock of 90* was great. The crowd at Bangalore has been great. I was hitting the ball hard and wanted to cash on the momentum. This innings will give the team confidence going into the matches ahead.
Royal Challengers Bangalore won their 2nd match of the tournament in the 5th match. Sunrisers Hyderabad will face Chennai Super Kings in the first match at Hyderabad while Mumbai Indians will take on Rajasthan Royals at Jaipur.
