Back from beyond

Bengaluru, May 18

AB de Villiers and Moeen Ali struck breezy half-centuries as Royal Challengers Bangalore held their nerves under pressure to eke out a 14-run win over table-toppers Sunrisers Hyderabad in a must-win match and stay afloat in the Indian Premier League here on Thursday.
Asked to bat, RCB posted a mammoth 218/6 before surviving a scare from Sunrisers skipper Kane Williamson (81 off 42) and Manish Pandey (62 off 38) to restrict the visitors to 204/3.
De Villiers (69 off 39) and Ali (65 off 34) overcame a bad start to stitch 107 runs off just 57 balls for the third wicket to not only set the platform for RCB’s total but also keep their team in contention.
Chasing the mammoth total, Sunrisers started on a positive note, piling up 47 runs off the first five overs before Shikhar Dhawan hit one straight back to Yuzvendra Chahal off his own bowling in the next over.
Alex Hales (37 off 24) was going great guns before de Villiers pulled off a blinder of a one-handed catch at mid-wicket boundary off Ali to send the Englishman back. But Sunrisers captain Williamson had other intentions as he took the attack to the opposition and hit Tim Southee for consecutive boundaries before clobbering Ali for two fours and a six in the next over to keep his team abreast with the required run-rate. Williamson went about his business in elegant fashion without taking much risk and was ably supported by Pandey at the other end as the duo stitched a magnificent 135 for the second wicket off just 68 deliveries to take Sunrisers close.
Williamsion, in particular, looked in sublime touch as he struck the ball to all parts of the ground without taking any undue risk, while Pandey took his time to get going.
But eventually the asking rate proved to be too tall for Sunrisers as Southee produced some brilliant death bowling display.