Faftastic! Du Plessis clobbers perfectly paced knock of 84 in 56 balls despite injury

Faf du Plessis during his 84 against Punjab Kings at Mohali yesterday. Pic/PTI

Faf du Plessis played a special knock despite a rib injury before Mohammed Siraj produced his best figures in the IPL to set up a 24-run win for Royal Challengers Bangalore against Punjab Kings here on Thursday.

Solid opening stand

Playing as an ‘Impact Player' due to his injury, Du Plessis plundered 84 off 56 balls and shared a 137-run opening wicket stand with stand-in captain Virat Kohli (59 off 47) to steer RCB to 174 for four after being put in to bat. Though in-form skipper Shikhar Dhawan was unavailable for the second game in a row, Punjab had enough firepower to chase down 175, but lost too many wickets at the start of the chase.

Siraj delivered with wickets with the new ball as well as in the death overs to end up with 4-21 in four overs and secure a welcome victory for his team. Jitesh Sharma's counter-attacking 41 off 27 for Punjab went in vain. It was RCB's third win in six games while Punjab suffered their third loss in six matches. Siraj was too hot to handle in the Powerplay as he removed left-hander Atharva Taide with a sharp inswinger off the second ball of the innings before removing the dangerous Liam Livingstone in the fourth over. Both lbw dismissals came after successful DRS reviews.

Also Read: RCB favourites as PBKS sweat over injured skipper Dhawan

Hasaranga strikes

Wanindu Hasaranga then castled Matthew Short with a googly before run-outs of Sam Curran and Harpreet Bhatia made matters worse for the home team. At 97-6, the game looked done and dusted, but Jitesh Sharma kept Punjab in the game with some clean hitting, especially down the ground.

Brief scores
RCB 174-4 in 20 overs (F du Plessis 84, V Kohli 59; H Brar 2-31) beat PBKS 150 all out in 18.2 overs (P Singh 46, J Sharma 41; M Siraj 4-21, W Hasaranga 2-39) by 24 runs

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