“I am banking on Rohit to come good,” Faf du Plessis backs Rohit Sharma

On Thursday, Royal Challengers Bangalore scored a much-needed victory over Gujarat Titans to stay alive in the playoff race. RCB’s eight-wicket win ruled Punjab Kings and Sunrisers Hyderabad out of the race. Now, the competition is down to Delhi Capitals and Bangalore for the fourth spot in the points tally.

Faf du Plessis & Men need Mumbai Indians to defeat Delhi Capitals in their last league match to qualify for the playoffs. However, if DC wins against the five-time champion on Saturday, they will book a berth in the playoffs due to a better net run rate than Bangalore.

Speaking about RCB’s performance against the Titans, skipper Faf praised his team for putting up an all-around effort. The South African stalwart believes that their side has done the job, and now everything depends on the result of the MI vs DC fixture. He also backed MI skipper Rohit Sharma to play a big knock on Saturday. 

“Tonight was really important for obvious reasons. You want to finish the competition strong and show that you are a group of people that has character within the dressing room. I think the worst thing for us that could have happened tonight was putting in a soft performance. 

That was really important for me to see from us as a group today and control what’s in our hands. You always want to finish strongly. A few inconsistent performances have put us in this situation. I am banking on Rohit to come good,” Faf du Plessis said during the post-match presentation.

There were a lot of positives for Bangalore on Thursday at the Wankhede Stadium. Former Indian captain Virat Kohli finally rolled back to form after a lean patch throughout the season. He played an excellent knock of 73 runs off 54 runs to help his team chase the target of 169 with each.

Glenn Maxwell also rose to the occasion. The spin all-rounder applied finishing touches to RCB’s batting innings by playing a blistering knock of 40 runs off just 18 balls. Faf seemed extremely happy with Kohli’s form as he heaped praises on the veteran.

“Throughout the season we haven’t done as much as have liked. But you still need to back these big players. Virat had been putting in the hard yards in the nets. I play the role with him and get him pumped up. He has got so much emotion and he pulls you through,” Faf concluded.