Buttler back with a bang to help Rajasthan Royals stay unbeaten
Jaipur, India - Jos Buttler was a much relieved man on Saturday after the Rajasthan Royals opener roared back into form with a scintillating hundred to fashion his team’s fourth consecutive victory in the ongoing Indian Premier League (IPL).
The England white-ball captain managed scores of 11, 11 and 13 in his first three matches even though 2008 champions Rajasthan kept winning.
Chasing 184 for victory against Royal Challengers Bengaluru, Buttler proved why he is considered a T20 stalwart and smashed a 58-ball 100 sealing Rajasthan’s victory with five balls to spare.
Virat Kohli smashed an unbeaten 113 for Bengaluru, his record-extending eighth hundred in IPL, but still ended up on the losing side.
“I think however long you’ve played the game, you still have the anxiety and stress,” Buttler said afterwards. “The mind is a powerful thing. Sometimes it’s not easy, you just got to tell yourself everything will be okay. You’ve played for a long time, try and sort of dig into the things you’ve done well, keep working hard. There’s no secret to it. And you need a little bit of luck along the way, but just sort of having faith, at some point you’ll be okay.”
Buttler said Rajasthan must capitalise on their strong start to stay in contention for a playoff berth. “We’ve started this season really well,” he said.
“We’ve been together for three seasons, everyone’s comfortable with each other, we just need to keep this momentum going.”
“I did feel really good in the last game even though I got
We’ve been together for three seasons, everyone’s comfortable with each other, we just need to keep this momentum going
13,” Buttler said. “I had a really good tournament [SA20] in South Africa at the start of the year, but coming to the IPL, I think, sort of relaying on from the finish of IPL last year where I struggled a bit, I needed one innings to put that to bed and I now look forward.”
While it augurs well for England ahead of their T20 World Cup title defence in June, Rajasthan head coach Kumar Sangakkara said Buttler’s return to form was merely a matter of time.
“Jos is the best white-ball opener in the world, and all he needed to do was sit back and ignore some of the noise,” said the Sri Lankan.