NEW DELHI: AB de Villiers lived up to his ‘Superman’ tag by pulling off yet another miraculous catch, this time against Sunrisers Hyderabad to dismiss batsman Alex Hales at the Chinnaswamy Stadium on Thursday. Needing 219 to win, Sunrisers chase was into its eighth over when their Hales launched spinner Moeen Ali into the night sky for what looked like his fourth six. But De Villiers believed and proved otherwise as he leapt high and instinctively stretched out his right hand to pluck the ball swirling away from him. Skipper Virat Kohli termed it a “Spiderman-like” effort.
“When Alex Hales struck the ball high and hard over mid-wicket during our match against SRH in Bengaluru, my first thought was ‘try and create a chance’. I needed to run hard, to make metres just to get a hand on the ball, before I could even think of taking a catch. So I picked my line and ran as hard as possible, keeping my eyes fixed on the ball, but it was soaring high, up high into the night sky,” de Villiers wrote in Saturday’s column for TOI.
A gravity defying act, de Villiers went on to explain the science behind his stunning effort.
“Something else was needed. A jump was needed, so I slowed down a little, creating space to use my arms to propel myself as far into the air as possible… so I jumped, and reached up and backwards and, somehow, the ball stuck in my outstretched right hand. The job wasn’t half done. As I came down, the ball slipped from my fingers and I only just managed to push it towards my stomach… and then to hold what must rate as one of the most satisfying catches of my career,” the South African mentioned.
That wasn’t the only bit of action de Villiers was involved in. Earlier, as RCB went on to pile a huge total of 218, de Villiers scored 69 off 39 balls, and along with Ali (65 off 34), allowed the team a total that required stiff chasing. Once Hales fell, it was all up to their captain Kane Williamson, who batted splendidly for his seventh half-century of the edition. But once he departed in the final over bowled by Mohammed Siraj, RCB defended the total and went on to win the match by 14 runs, and hence somehow still remained in contention for the Playoff.
“Hales was out and, even with Kane Williamson maintaining his dazzling form, SRH fell 14 runs short of the target; so we won again, so we stayed in the competition. It was a special night in front of our supporters at the M.Chinnaswamy stadium. We thought 170-180 would be decent, but Moeen Ali produced a great knock,” said de Villiers.
