The winning stroke that sailed over long-on and into the stands off Jofra Archer’s bowling was characteristic of Quinton de Kock. Particularly, when he’s connecting the ball well and picking up the lengths brilliantly.
The Rajasthan Royals were clearly 20-25 runs short on the Guwahati pitch, though it wasn’t a 200-plus wicket. Yet, the going could well have got tricky for the Knights as their batting didn’t inspire much confidence in decent conditions at the Eden during the tournament opener last week.
Nonetheless, De Kock remained composed and exhibited his class to help his side bounce back quickly following the defeat to Royal Challengers Bengaluru. It has been a while since De Kock last played international cricket, though he’s yet to announce his T20I retirement.
Sources in the South African board claim he may not be considered for next year’sT20 World Cup even if he finishes this IPL on a super successful note.
However, these things shouldn’t be of much concern for De Kock, who’s keener on making good use of the opportunity provided to him by the Knight Riders.
“It’s nice to get an opportunity and make it count. To be fair, I’ve not felt any challenges yet (being away from international cricket),” De Kock, adjudged Man of the Match, said at the post-match presentation.
“Coming back to cricket, we had 10 days of camp and practice matches, so that made it pretty easy.”
Talking about his unbeaten innings of 97 off 61 balls, the keeper-batter said: “This is only my second game in this IPL season. Luckily, we batted second, so as a keeper, I watched how the wicket behaved and could adjust accordingly while batting.
“I know the IPL is known for big scores, but I just tried to win the game for our team.”
Captain Ajinkya Rahane was all praise for the Knights’ bowling group.
“Credit to our bowling unit as they were always looking for wickets. The middleovers were really crucial with two spinners and Sunil (Narine) not well. Moeen got his opportunity and bowled really well,” Rahane said.