Skipper Faf du Plessis' knock of pain fails to help RCB trump CSK in Southern Derby

Royal Challengers Bangalore skipper Faf du Plessis was on song with the willow and led his side from the front in the recently culminated Indian Premier League clash with Chennai Super Kings at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bangalore on Monday, April 17. Though the contest ended not per the expectations of the home side as they went down by just eight runs in a run-fest like no other.

But RCB put up a brave fight as they tried chasing down a humongous total of 227. But what was more valiant than the same was the way their skipper fought through the pain and put up a valiant effort to take his side tantalisingly close to victory. He batted with his abdomen bandaged heavily and scored a phenomenal fifty.

Despite enduring a significant amount of pain, du Plessis didn't get bogged down by the same and the arduous task that lay in front of him. He lost his opening partner Virat Kohli fairly early as the latter was dismissed by CSK's young left-arm seamer Akash Singh in the very first over of the run chase.

Disaster struck twice for RCB when young gun Mahipal Lomror also perished without troubling the scorers. Taking matters into his own hands du Plessis scripted a remarkable comeback for the home side. He cashed in every scoring opportunity that came his way and struck an impressive century stand with Glenn Maxwell.

Faf scored a fluent fifty and gave no signs of pain or discomfort. He reached his fifty off just 23 balls and went on to score 62 off just 33 balls. His knock of pain included five fours and he was able to send the ball flying into the Chinnaswamy crowd on four occasions. He took his side to the cusp of victory but failed to convert his knock into a match-winning one as he fell to Moeen Ali on the last delivery of the 14th over.