Dinesh Karthik lauds Virat Kohli and AB de Villiers

Dinesh Karthik praised Royal Challengers Bangalore batting stars Virat Kohli and AB de Villiers for their superb knocks against his team the Gujarat Lions. Both Kohli and de Villiers scored hundreds which saw RCB post a total of 248/3 in 20 overs and win the game by a huge 144-run margin. The RCB duo slammed twin centuries and put on a splendid batting display for one and all to see. Moreover, the bowlers came to the party as well as they took wickets in tandem and for the first time in a few years, the Challengers bowled out a side.

More than a long face, Karthik addressed the media with a sinister smile on his face. The wicketkeeper-batsman also added that the loss of wickets in regular intervals saw the foundation crumble.

Dinesh Karthik said: “I was in a better position than the runner also; I was that close to the batsman. It was mind-boggling. This kind of innings doesn’t happen often. They are two special players and they really stood up today for the team and did a brilliant job for RCB,” he conceded.

“The key in a chase like 248 is the start; we were straightaway two wickets down in the powerplay. From there you’re just trying,” Karthik said. “If you look at getting going, you’re going to score runs, but if you don’t get going, you just shut shop and say ‘let’s just play the 20 overs and come out’. I think Chahal bowled a good spell and took a couple of wickets. They kept the pressure on us.”

“Wickets matter in these sort of games and they got those upfront and in the middle, they got two in two balls. Once wickets keep falling, the bowlers are on top. Then it was up to the lower-middle order. It is very hard for them to come and keep going from ball one. The game was gone. From there we were just playing catch up and make sure we bat as long as we can for the run rate. To be fair to them, nothing that we did worked. Apart from the toss, nothing went right for us. These things don’t happen too often, but it was one of those days that caught us unaware.”

“I think after a game like this, it’s good to have a five-day break,” Karthik acknowledged. “You need two days to just feel the game and forget it and then move on. In five days’ time, we would come back as better players…at least, we would’ve forgotten these two innings. Because if we had to come back to play tomorrow or day after you would see the backlash. We would’ve been a bit worried going into the game. To be fair, five days is a good break for us. Some of the guys are going away in a couple of days off for us and we would regroup after. We got two important games and we would want to come out hard there.”

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