IPL 2021: It’s Quite A Big Rivalry, Always A Big Game For Us - Quinton de Kock On Playing Against Chennai Super Kings
Published - 01 May 2021, 07:24 PM | Updated - 23 Aug 2024, 12:45 AM
Quinton de Kock, the Mumbai Indians opener, speaks about the fierce rivalry and the magnitude of their upcoming game against the Chennai Super Kings on Saturday at the Arun Jaitley Stadium in Delhi.
Known as the ‘El Clásico’ of the IPL, the two most successful sides go into Saturday’s clash with victories behind them. Quinton de Kock points out that though MS Dhoni’s side is in superb form with 5 consecutive wins, the Rohit Sharma-led outfit, too, will enter the contest with a convincing victory over the Rajasthan Royals a couple of days ago.
The left-hander terms it as a “big rivalry” and says that they will be “nice and tough” against the table leaders. Overall Mumbai has an upper hand over MS Dhoni’s Yellow Army with 19 wins and 13 losses; MI has also defeated CSK in 3 IPL finals!
“Obviously playing against Chennai is a big game. It’s quite a big rivalry and every time we play against them, you always hear the talk of it. So it is always a big game for us. Saying that, when we do play them, we know they are going to be tough but we’ll also be nice and tough. So it will be a good competition, I’m sure,”Quinton de Kock said in the video posted on Mumbai Indians Twitter handle.
“They (CSK) got a lot of confidence. They have won five games in a row. We are three from six but saying that, in the past, since I’ve been with Mumbai, we have done really well against Chennai as a team. So it’s going to be a good match,” he added.
It was nice to be scoring some runs again: Quinton de Kock
Another major positive for Mumbai Indians from their victory over the Rajasthan Royals was the return to the form of Quinton de Kock himself. The opener had scored 47 runs in his first 4 innings at a strike rate of 87.04.
As Mumbai moved out of the difficult batting pitch of Chennai to a better surface in Delhi, the South African roared back to runs, with a match-winning unbeaten 70* off 50 balls.
“It was nice to start batting, to be scoring some runs again for the team. It’s only one game but yeah, it was nice playing out there.
“Our last game which we won was also important and we did it very convincingly. We need to take the confidence going into our next match. I’m not saying we have momentum yet but if there’s ever a starting point, it is now for us, for the rest of the tournament,” the southpaw asserted.
