South African batter Faf du Plessis will lead Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) as its captain in the 2022 edition of the Indian Premiere League (IPL), the team management announced on March 12.
The appointment was necessitated as RCB's incumbent skipper Virat Kohli had, during the tournament's last edition in October 2021, announced that this would be his final stint as the skipper of the franchise.
Du Plessis, 37, was sold to the RCB for Rs 7 crore in the auction held last month. The right-handed top order batter has cumulatively scored 2,935 runs in his IPL career, having played for two franchises so far - Pune Supergiants and Chennai Super Kings (CSK).
In the 2021 edition of the tournament, he was among the successful batters, having scored 633 runs for the CSK. He was awarded the man-of-the-match title in the final match for his 86-run knock against Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR).
"Happy to pass on the baton to Faf! Excited to partner with him and play under him (sic)," Kohli said on social media after the RCB announced Du Plessis as the next skipper.
This will be the first time in over a decade when the RCB will be led by a new captain. Since 2011, the team was headed by Kohli. However, his leadership had come under constant criticism as the RCB was among the three sides that have never won the IPL title.
For Du Plessis, the captaincy role is not an unfamiliar task as he has led the South African side in 115 One Day International (ODI) games. Out of these, the Proteas had emerged victorious in 81. He had also captained the side in 40 T20 International matches, and the team was successful in winning 25 among them. In February 2020, Du Plessis had relinquished his role as the South African captain to focus on his batting career.
His stint as the RCB captain would formally begin on March 27, when the franchise is scheduled to clash against Punjab Kings at Navi Mumbai's DY Patil stadium.
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