Virat Kohli’s excellent century (100 off 63) and Faf du Plessis’ fine fifty (71 off 47) helped Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) thrash Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) by eight wickets in Match No. 65 of Indian Premier League (IPL) 2023 at Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium, here on Thursday.
With this win, RCB jumped to the fourth position in the table having 14 points in 13 matches and boosted their playoff chances. On the other hand, SRH remained at the bottom of the table with just four wins in 13 games.
South African wicket-keeper batter Heinrich Klaasen’s maiden IPL century (104 off 51) propelled Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) to 186/5 in 20 overs. After Klaasen, Harry Brook (27 off 19) was the second-best scorer for SRH. Both Klaasen and Brook stitched a quickfire stand of 74 runs for the fourth wicket. On the other hand, Michael Bracewell was the most successful bowler for RCB with his superb 2-13.
Chasing 187 to win, Virat Kohli looked in fine touch right from the beginning and smashed a fantastic century after a long wait of four years. He stitched a massive opening partnership of 172 runs with Faf du Plessis.
In the very next delivery after his ton, Kohli got out to Bhuvneshwar Kumar in the fifth ball of the 18th over but he had done more than enough for his side.
Though Du Plessis was dismissed by Natarajan in the next over, the likes of Glenn Maxwell (5 not out) and Michael Bracewell (4 not out) took RCB over the victory line with four balls to spare.
