“First ball goes for 4 or 6”

Royal Challengers Bengaluru’s (RCB) hard-hitter Tim David has made a massive claim ahead of their IPL 2025 against the Mumbai Indians on Monday. David believes they must put Jasprit Bumrah under pressure early, hitting his first ball for a four or six.

Bumrah will return to competitive cricket for the first time since January as MI coach Mahela Jayawardene declared him fit for the clash on Monday. The right-arm pacer had missed the first four matches due to recovering from a back injury.

Speaking at a pre-game presser, David claimed Bumrah is an amazing bowler and it’s great to see him back as the game is good when he plays. As quoted by India Today, the right-hander said:

“Yeah Bumrah’s pretty widely recognized as the best bowler going around and that’s the challenge we want to have at RCB. If we’re going to go deep in this tournament, we need to beat the best teams, we need to beat the best players. So, hopefully Bumrah is bowling the first over tomorrow night and the first ball goes for 4 or 6 from whoever’s opening the batting for us, that’ll be a statement.”

“It’ll be great to have him back playing in the tournament because the game’s better with him in it.”

David, who has also featured for the Mumbai Indians, wasn’t retained by them ahead of the auction, where RCB nabbed him for ₹3 crore. He has played a couple of cameos in this edition to prop up RCB.

“You want to be challenged by the best” – Tim David ahead of RCB’s clash against MI

David also claimed how difficult Bumrah’s yorkers are to get away from, but said he is equally looking forward to facing that, adding:

“I’ll just try and get my toes out of the way, he’s got a pretty lethal yorker. He’s a brilliant bowler and when you put in big performances against the best teams, against the best players, they’re the best feelings you get as a player. So you want to be challenged by the best and I’m looking forward to that.”

The Royal Challengers are coming off a crushing defeat to the Gujarat Titans at home.

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Aayushman is a cricket journalist at Sportskeeda who covers news, features and listicles. A Finance graduate with a diploma in journalism, he has a total work experience of around 7 years and has bylines at reputed websites like Free Press Journal, Cricket Addictor, and Roar. Aayushman believes in presenting all the relevant information and facts in his articles to let the readers form their own opinions. His exploits in the industry have led to interview former Australia stalwart David Hussey.

A former Tata Consultancy Services employee, Aayushman has been supporting the Australian men’s national team after being impressed with their aggressive and never-say-die attitude in the 2003 ICC World Cup. His favorite cricketer is Steve Smith, whose tremendous self-belief in his methods, despite them being unorthodox, inspire him a lot. Smith’s performances from 2019 Ashes Series only fueled this inspiration further. He would like to revisit the 2015 ICC World Cup semi-final clash between India and Australia if ever got hold of a time machine.

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Edited by Vaishnavi Iyer