AB de Villiers talks about the expectations everyone had of him during his heydays.
Mumbai Indians lost their opening encounter against Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) by a huge margin. Most of their batters had a below-par game. Hence, no one could provide support to Tilak Varma, who was batting as a lone warrior.
Rohit Sharma is out of form since eternity in the IPL. His form is a major concern for Mumbai Indians. However, another vital MI batter quiet with the willow of late.
Suryakumar Yadav is going through a tough patch at the moment. He was dismissed on a golden duck in all three matches in the recently-concluded ODI series against Australia. In the opening game of Mumbai Indians against Royal Challengers Bangalore this season, Suryakumar could manage only 15 runs off 16 deliveries.
While the sample size is small, Suryakumar Yadav’s low scores are a bit concerning. He has set a high benchmark for himself in the last couple of years or so. Hence, the expectations are always very high.
The former Proteas and RCB batter, AB de Villiers, shares his opinion on SKY. According to him, Suryakumar Yadav should not panic or change his plan.
AB exclaimed, “He is probably in that phase now where he needs to do something. But the secret of it all is not to panic and not to change your game plan. He has got to stick to what has been working for him over the years.”
Yes, maybe, he can try and remember ‘what are my basics’ or ‘what did I do very well when I was just consistently scoring runs’, and because obviously, he took his game to a completely different level,” AB added.
Sticking to basics is easier said than done. It is never easy for a player to stick to basics when things aren’t going right.
AB further said, “You cannot always score 100 off 40 balls – it is not always going to happen. That is something I had to learn the hard way with the Chinnaswamy crowd going, expecting me to score a hundred in every game.”
As mentioned earlier, the expectations from Suryakumar Yadav are very high. But AB de Villiers want him not to expect too much from himself. AB has made an essential point.
Every player goes through a rough patch in their career. Only the best ones manage to overcome the phase and thrive again. With the kind of player Suryakumar Yadav is, expect him to resume doing ‘SKY things’ again very soon.
