da dobrowin： The former SA batsman strung together a devastating stand of 184 with Alex Hales to lift Rangpur from 5 for 2 and see them home in 187-run chase with ten balls to spare
The Report by Peter Della Penna28-Jan-2019
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How the game played outThe Rangpur Riders runaway train whistled past Dhaka Dynamites at breakneck speed in a thumping eight-wicket win with 10 balls to spare. AB de Villiers and Alex Hales were joint conductors during a rollicking 184-run partnership, the highest of BPL 2019. De Villiers, who had simmered in his first two innings of BPL 2019, finally exploded for a 50-ball unbeaten century, while Hales clubbed 85 not out off 53 balls, including the winning runs.Rangpur’s rampaging Powerplay, which they ended on 63, made the Dynamites effort look tame by comparison, especially considering that the Dynamites took until their 21st ball to score a boundary after having chosen to bat first. The early crawl cost them on a batting paradise that produced two centuries on the day, first from the bat of Evin Lewis of Comilla Victorians in the afternoon’s first game, before de Villiers capped off the night with his match-winning ton for the Riders.Turning points Shakib Al Hasan was scoring at over 200, but went too far across his stumps while attempting to scoop Farhad Reza in the 12th over, to be bowled for 25. Reza pulled off his second dramatic catch of the day in the 14th over, running 20 yards left at deep midwicket, before extending his body full tilt and hurling himself to clutch onto a skier from Andre Russell just inside the boundary. After Russell dismissed Chris Gayle and Rilee Rossouw in the second over, de Villiers hooked the hat-trick ball for six, and then proceeded to torch Shakib, Russell and Sunil Narine for 22 more off his next seven balls, all of them through boundariesStar of the dayDe Villiers showed why he’s a modern great with a typically audacious counterattack. He didn’t flinch in hooking Russell first up, and never looked back thereafter. He took 24 balls to reach his half-century, and another 26 to reach three figures in a chanceless effort, all while the Chattogram crowd chanted “A-B! A-B!”The big missPerhaps sensing the need to have a big finish on a flat pitch, Dynamites allrounder Kieron Pollard decided before the start of the 20th over that he would face everything. While he hit two boundaries against Shafiul Islam, he also turned down three singles, before chipping a yorker for one off the innings’ last ball, failing to provide the desired boom at the end of the Dynamites innings.Where the teams standRiders moved into a three-way tie for first place on 12 points with Comilla Victorians and Chittagong Vikings, though Riders hold the edge over both on net run rate. Dynamites remain tied for fourth with Rajshahi Kings on 10 points, but Dynamites have a game in hand as well as a massive net run rate advantage.