All cricket fans who thronged to the M Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bangalore to watch the Royal Challengers Bangalore face the Gujarat Lions would have witnessed one of the best T20 matches of all time. However, at the end, it was joy for the RCB and misery for the Lions as the home side thrashed the visitors by a massive 144 runs.
RCB, after having been put into bat first, put up the second highest T20 total of all time after being powered by brilliant centuries from captain Virat Kohli and AB de Villiers. In reply, Gujarat Lions kept losing wickets at regular intervals as they were bowled out for a measly 104.
Here is how the cricketing fraternity reacted to the thrilling match:
Man-of-the-match, AB de Villiers:
“Actually, I didn't feel too good in the beginning, it was difficult to time the ball initially. My secret's very simple - my wife is here to watch. A lot of things played a role today, I walked out there feeling scareless, no fear of losing my wicket. Virat and I made good decisions while batting and assessed things very well and we accelerated very well at the end.
“I hate facing dot balls in T20s and I'm disappointing with the ones today (nine against Jadeja). Jaddu bowled very well today. It's about playing the right shots at the right time, it wasn't just about the boundaries. (Laughs) I'm really angry for facing those dot balls today.”
Gujarat Lions stand-in captain, Brendon McCullum:
“We had two world-class batters today and they played two of the greatest T20 innings in the history. Pretty disappointing for us but great to watch as a fan. We tried spin against AB but he took them on early on and got us back under pressure. We tried spin, tried to bowl short, tried to take the pace off but nothing worked.
“We'll try to dust this off and flush this down and come back stronger. Hopefully, our skipper will be back in the next game and we'll try to get us through to the semi-finals. Margins can look great on paper but we need to get early wickets…but there's one team that turned up today. We'll try and turn things around now.”
Royal Challengers Bangalore captain, Virat Kohli:
“I have all the right to smile today, everything went as per plans despite losing the toss. It can be pretty disheartening after losing 9 out of 11 tosses. It feels good that the guys are ready for it, our equation is pretty clear as it's like the playoffs from here. We don't want to push or pressurise ourselves too much, we know we are batting with intent and with good strike rates.
“It's important to not get ahead of ourselves. If you try extra you might end up scoring 150 instead of 180. We don't think about the game too much, we just react instinctively, and play smart cricket. I didn't want to speak about how well we had played and we gave the guys a realistic target of 170 to defend for the NRR.
“The guys have responded very well at the business and of the tournament. We want to take the responsibility and take the pressure. Every day is a new opportunity for some youngster to perform and win the game for RCB, that's the most exciting thing going ahead.”
Gujarat Lions captain, Suresh Raina:
Mumbai Indians wicketkeeper-batsman, Jos Buttler:
Sunrisers Hyderabad all-rounder, Yuvraj Singh:
Indian cricket commentator, Harsha Bhogle:
Indian cricket commentator, Aakash Chopra:
Sunrisers Hyderabad captain, David Warner:
Kings XI Punjab batsman, David Miller:
Sunrisers Hyderabad batsman, Eoin Morgan:
New Zealand all-rounder, Jimmy Neesham:
Zimbabwe cricket commentator, Pommie Mbangwa:
Former England batsman, Mark Butcher:
Former England women's cricketer, Isa Guha:
Former Australian women's cricketer, Lisa Sthalekar:
