AB de Villiers produced a masterclass with the bat and Navdeep Saini’s brilliant penultimate over kept Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) afloat as they beat Kings XI Punjab by 17 runs at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bengaluru on Wednesday.
De Villiers’ unbeaten 82 off 44 balls took RCB to a mammoth 202/4 but things could have gone awry with KXIP wicketkeeper-batsman Nicholas Pooran (46 off 28 balls) hitting five sixes at the rear. It was then when Saini sealed the deal for the hosts in the 19th over where he conceded three runs and took two wickets.
KXIP finished at 185/7 in their 20 overs and RCB are now🀅 on eight points with three games left — moving away from the bottom of the table.
With four wins🍬 in the last five games, the Royal Challengers will hope to win the remai🍬ning three and expect a few favourable results to make it to the play-offs as rank outsiders.
Here’s how Twitter reacted:
Scoreline does not reflect how close this match acutally was. Pun𒁏jab’s spark📖ling bid to chase down 202 fizzled out only in the last over. RCB reap reward of spectacular batting by ABD, but bowling and fielding could be better
— Cricketwallah (@cricketwallah)
AB De Villiers…. now you sir, are a JOKE! 😳😳👏🏼👏🏼
— Ben Duckett (@BenDuckett1)
A B Delivers. Once again.
— Aakash Chopra (@cricketaakash)
Mr.🦄 360 sending the ball on the rooftop!! Punjab could not finish it off well at all, Parthiv at the top looking really impressivཧe.
— R P Singh रुद्र प्रताप सिंह (@rpsingh)
Why did AB hav𝔍e to retire from I♒nternational cricket?!! We all would of loved to have seen him in the WC next month.
— Lisa Sthalekar (@sthalekar93)
THIS 🅘is my team!! This is the the fans love. Win or lose, 🍌THIS is our team!
— Nikhil Chinapa (@nikhilchinapa)
Love reaction catching Great entertainment and !! 👏�𒆙� Mother cricket alway🐎s gets you!!
— Paul Collingwood (@Colly622)
Stop th𝓡e press. are no longer last in the points table!
— Saurabh Somani (@saurabh_42)
P🍷unjab choked. Should have won this one but the last 3 overs of their batting, just like their bowling was KXIP’s nemesi꧋s
— Vikrant Gupta (@vikrantgupta73)
The tortoise is on the move …
— Jatin Sapru (@jatinsapru)
So Ume💯sh Yadav 🥀redeeming himself tonight but must say Navdeep Saini was superb. And what fielding from him. How can he not play the World Cup! 3 for on the trot.
— Boria Majumdar (@BoriaMajumdar)
AB de Villiers (265.4ꦺ) has gone past Andre Russell (255.8) in terms ⛦of the highest batting strike-rate during the death this season.
— Shubh Agarwal (@shubh_chintak)
Most Man of the Match awards for RCB in IPL:
18 AB de Villiers
17 Chris Gayle
12 Virat KohliOverall in IPL:
21 Gayle
20 ABD
16 Pathan, Rohit, Dhoni, Warner— Bharath Seervi (@SeerviBharath)
wow, more tha❀n a month into the tournament and RCB are finally off the bottom!
— Gaurav Kalra (@gauravkalra75)
AB de Villiers' last five balls for RCB:
Six
Six
Six – out of the stadium
1lb
SixMasterclass.
— bet365 (@bet365)
Last five overs today:
RCB : 80 runs (RR : 16.00)
AB de Vi♉lliers : 46 runs off 15 balls 🐓(SR : 306.67)— Umang Pabari (@UPStatsman)
. treated us to hi🍰s range of 360 degree 𓆏shots in a knock of 82* (44) to walk away with the Man of the Match award👏
— IndianPremierLeague (@IPL)
"I'm like a 'ComeBack Kid' – you can't keep me down for long!" Beat @lionsdenkxip by 17 Runs 🔥👑
— RCB Bold Brigade (@BoldBrigade)
