Virat Kohli and AB de Villiers strung a partnership of 157 runs off 87 balls as Royal Challengers Bangalore secured a comfortable 45-run win over Sunrisers Hyderabad in their opening match of the IPL at Bengaluru on Tuesday.
The bowlers defended the steep total comfortably on a batting beauty despite a spectacular knock from the Sunrisers captain David Warner (58 off 25), limiting the opposition to 182 for six in 20 overs.
With Sunrisers reaching 83 for one in eight overs, the game was very much in the balance.
Warner was in good form after the departure of his opening partner Shikhar Dhawan (8), who was bowled by Parvez Rasool. He hit five sixes in his entertaining innings which ended with a pull off fellow Australian Shane Watson. Soon after his wicket, RCB took three quick wickets to reduce Sunrisers to 101 for five in the 12th over. Needing almost three runs a ball at one stage, Eoin Morgan (22 not out) and Ashish Reddy (32 off 18) tried their best but couldn’t succeed.
Brief scores:
Royal Challengers Banglaore: 227 for 4 in 20 overs (Virat Kohli 75, AB de Villiers 82; Bhuvneshwar Kumar 2 for 55, Mustafizur Rahamn 2 for 26) beat
Sunrisers Hyderabad: 182 for 6 in 20 overs (David Warner 58; Shane Watson 2 for 30) by 45 runs.
Man of the Match: AB de Villiers
Reactions to the match:
He’s a cool dude isn’t he – Sarfaraz #eit20 #RCBvSRH
— Isa Guha (@isaguha) April 12, 2016
Stuart Binny is like the jeera in my jeera rice. Always unused. #RCBvSRH
— Nirali (@Nilu0623) April 12, 2016
@imVkohli most selfless player of cricket 😍😍 @ABdeVilliers17 #Rcbians #RCBvSRH @RCBTweets pic.twitter.com/ZP4gWGW4yF
— Aditi ❤ (@SRKianPrincess) April 12, 2016
– And The Best Part of The Flick was SARFARAZ ‘s 35 of 10 !! 👌❤️
— Saddam Sama ☄ (@SaddamSama) April 12, 2016
Ofcourse ABD n Virat played brilliantly tonight! But you can’t ignore what sarfaraz contributed. His was the game changing innings. #RCBvSRH
— Shravan Singh (@shravannsinghh) April 12, 2016
