IPL: AB de Villiers plays the rescue act

BENGALURU: The South African duo of AB de Villiers (57, 40b, 2x4, 4x6) and Quinton de Kock (45, 34b, 7x4; 1x6), showed amazing temperament and character to ensure a home win for Royal Challengers Bangalore on Friday night.
At the packed M Chinnaswamy stadium, chasing a modest target of 156 set by Kings XI Punjab, Royal Challengers Bangalore survived a few anguish moments when they lost quick wickets in the end, but came through with a four-wicket win in the last over .
Axar Patel delivered an early jolt to RCB when Brendon McCullum slashed to find Mujeeb ul Rehman at backward point. With Kohli and De Kock settling in, Mujeeb, the 17-year-old offspinner from Afghanistan claimed the prized wicket of skipper Kohli (21, 16b, 4x4), out-foxing him with a googly which disturbed the timber.
The two South Africans then carried the innings through for the next six overs with De Kock scoring the bulk of the runs during the 54-run third wicket stand. His innings ended when he attempted to put away Ashwin (2-30) for a big one but mistimed it with the ball crashing into the stumps. The next ball Sarfaraz Khan went back with the youngster poking a leg break delivery from the opposition skipper to an alert Karun Nair at first slip. Mandeep Singh then supported De Villiers during the 59-run fifth wicket partnership.
Earlier, the home team bowlers spearheaded by Umesh Yadav (3-23), showed character and discipline to restrict the visitors. Punjab, who starting with the fourth over lost wickets at regular intervals, breeched the 150-mark courtesy a stroke-filled 30-ball-47 from KL Rahul, a skipper’s knock by R Ashwin and a handy 26-ball-29 by Karun.
Rahul took apart Chris Woakes in the opening over. Playing at his home grind, Rahul made his intentions clear with back-to-back maximums over covers and square leg boundary and then dispatched the last ball of the over to the short fine leg boundary.
But Yadav, with a new hairdo and refreshed pace, swung the match heavily in favour of the home side as he got rid of Mayank (15), the dangerous Aaron Finch (0) and Yuvraj Singh (4) with the first two wickets falling off success balls. Mayank, who was earlier dropped by Sarfaraz Khan at deep square leg, attempted to drive Umesh but nicked it to wicketkeeper Quinton De Kock who made no mistake in plucking the ball in quick time.