Picture Courtesy : BCCI
A B De Villiers is known match winner just for nothing . The South African great once again showed why he is one of the greatest batsman of his generation with another impactful innings. De Villiers smashed a blazing 57 off 40 with several towering sixes as he helped RCB record their first win of IPL 2018.
Played at front of the packed stadium in Bengaluru. Among the celebrities on the stands were RCB skipper Virat Kohli’s wife , Bollywood actress Anushka Sharma who was cheering for the RCB all along. he looked tense too when things got tough for while for the home side . Kings XI side were cheered on from the stands by their co-owner Bollywood actress Preity Zinta.
De Villiers made up for the failures of Brendon McCullum ( 0) and skipper Virat Kohli ( 21 off 16) bowled by a absolute beauty from 17 year-old Afghanistan spinner Mujeeb ur Rahman. De Villiers along with Quniton De Kock put RCB back on track with a useful stand of 54 runs . De Kock scored 45. The RCB overtook the Kings XI Punjab total of 155 with 3 balls to spare as RCB reached 159 for 6 . Mandeep Singh ( 22 ) scored vital runs towards the end. Washington Sundar hitting the winning runs. Ravichandran Ashwin took 2 for 30 for the visitors.
Earlier , Seamer Umesh Yadav in fiery spell rocked the Kings XI Punjab batting line – up as Royal Challengers Bangalore bowled out the visitors for 155.
KXIP were reduced to 36 for 3 in the fourth over after Umesh (3/23) dismissed Mayank Aggarwal (15), Aaron Finch (0) and Yuvraj Singh (4) with a gem of a delivery knocking off his middle stump with sheer pace.
K L Rahul once again showed his mettle scoring a fine 47 off 30 balls. Skipper Ravichandran Ashwin contributed 33 off 21 balls while Karun Nair made 29. As the kings struggled to reach 155 and got bowled out. It was at least 20 – 30 run short.
