Sanjay Manjrekar, a former Indian batter who is now an expert, has made quite an audacious allegation about the legendary South African batter and former captain Ab de Villiers that he should have played for a different franchise in the cash-rich IPL. The former South African cricketer started his IPL career in 2008 with Delhi Capitals (formerly Delhi Daredevils), where he played three seasons. In the mega auction of IPL 2011, he was picked by Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB), where he played for 11 seasons before retiring in 2021.
De Villiers appeared in 184 IPL matches and accrued 5162 runs, apart from his missing an IPL title. He was in the final in 2011 and 2016 with RCB but lost with his franchise on both occasions.
Despite not winning an IPL trophy throughout his 14-year career as an IPL player, de Villiers is among the greats to have played in the IPL. According to Manjrekar, de Villiers wasn’t used properly in the IPL. Manjrekar believes that de Villiers should have batted up the order, and then, he added how Ab played for the wrong franchise.
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The panel was discussing whether Suryakumar Yadav had surpassed AB de Villiers as the Mr. 360. Manjrekar responded, “Once again, I will say yes, because of the match winning impact. AB was of a different class. And what made AB great was the fact that he was an average of fifty in Tests. Even Odis. So he is a very good player. But depending on how you see it in T20 cricket, I have seen both of them. Never did AB get proper usage in IPL. His real capacity. So, we really didn’t get that much out of him in IPL. Surely (batted higher). And sadly, for the wrong franchise. If he would have played somewhere else, we would have seen the greatness of AB de Villiers.”
Has @surya_14kumar eclipsed AB de Villiers as a better 360-degree player? 😳
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De Villiers is 2nd among RCB’s all-time run-getters in the IPL. He scored 4491 runs for the Virat Kohli-led side in 156 matches, including two centuries and 37 fifties. He is among the seven players in the IPL to have crossed the prestigious 5000-runs mark
