In this case, we observed benzylic hydrodefluorination product 2, indicating that the addition of a base accelerates the transformation of 2 into 3. When we performed the reaction with a reduced amount of silane (entry 10), for a shorter time (entry 11), or at a lower temperature (entry 12), a non-negligible amount of 2 was observed in each case. This observation supports the conclusion that 2 is a reaction intermediate to produce 3 (vide infra). Control experiments showed that the reaction is promoted by a nickel complex, albeit that a small quantity of the hydrodefluorination product was obtained without adding an NHC ligand (entries 13, 14).