Faf du Plessis opens up on a conversation he had with retired South African cricket AB de Villiers.
De Villiers holds the record for the fastest half-century (off 16 balls) and century (off 31 balls) in ODIs after he dismantled the West Indie’s bowling attack in Johannesburg, and is easily one of the best cricketers to ever play across all three formats.
His retirement came as a shock to the South African cricketing fraternity as a whole, especially considering that he was in really good nick at the time. His reasoning was solid, too. He wanted to give up international cricket to spend more time with his young family.
With the news out that AB offered his services on the day the Proteas squad was selected left Linda Zondi the CSA convener of selectors between a rock and a hard place, as the team was already selected and confirmed and he chose to stick to his current team based on merit.
With the Proteas having lost their first three matches and having only garnered one point from their abandoned match against the West Indies. We will never know how big of an impact the retired AB de Villiers would have had in South Africa’s world cup winning chances.
Critics have gone berserk with the news of AB de Villiers wanting to join the team at such short notice with the criticism of him wanting to pick and choose when to play leaving a sour taste in the cricket community’s mouth.
But according to IOL: CSA’s Linda Zondi said that these claims were untrue as Zondi chose to give de Villiers the option to plan his season in order to be at his optimum form prior to the World Cup, but de Villiers said he was at peace with his decision to retire.
Well, what’s done is done, and unfortunately, AB is not at the World Cup and I’m sure many spectators and current Protea players would have loved to have him there.
But the truth is, the Proteas have a World Cup to win, and that’s a task they will attempt to do without the services of AB de Villiers.
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