Team India’s former batter Gautam Gambhir, who’s known for his bold statements has come up with a strong statement on former South African batter AB de Villiers. Gautam Gambhir believes AB de Villiers only had personal IPL records as he didn’t win a single title for his side Royal Challengers Bangalore.
Anybody could have scored runs on the flat pitch at Chinnaswamy, says Gautam Gambhir on AB de Villiers’ IPL records
Former South African batter AB de Villiers is considered an IPL legend as he played multiple heroic knocks for his franchise Royal Challengers Bangalore. His ability to score all around the park made him refer to as ‘Mr 360’ and he used to be a nightmare for all the world-class bowlers.
However, former Indian batter Gautam Gambhir doesn’t seem to be very impressed with AB de Villiers’ records as he took a massive dig on the legendary batter while speaking about his Indian Premier League records on Star Sports.
“AB de Villiers only had personal records, didn’t win any title for RCB and batted on a small ground and flat pitch at Chinnaswamy. Anybody could have scored runs there,” Gautam Gambhir said on Star Sports.
Gambhir also compared AB de Villiers’ record to that of Chennai Super Kings’ star batter Suresh Raina and rated Raina’s performance as better between the two as the latter helped his team CSK to win 4 IPL trophies. While Gambhir gave the logic behind his bold statement, he has faced some backlash from cricket fans for criticizing one of the most loved cricketers.
It’s worth noting that during his career, ABD was considered as one of the most dangerous batters in the cash-rich league. Even the top-ranked International bowlers failed against him in the shortest format of the game.
The star Proteas batter played 184 games in the IPL in which he amassed 5162 runs at a healthy average of 39.71. He also smashed 3 tons and had a destructive career strike-rate of 151.69 which shows the overall impact he had during his peak days.
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Royal Challengers Bangalore once had a deadly trio of Virat Kohli, Chris Gayle and ABD in their squad which was enough to destroy any bowling lineup. Despite having such a batting lineup, the RCB franchise was criticized for not performing up to the mark. AB de Villiers too couldn’t make his win the IPL title despite playing innumerable match-winning knocks.