Having announced his retirement from all forms of cricket in November last year, AB de Villiers has no idea what the future holds in store for him. However, the former South Africa skipper is confident that he will have a role to play in the national team and his IPL franchise RCB’s future set-up.
During his illustrious career, De Villiers represented South Africa in 114 Tests, 228 ODIs, and 78 T20Is, amassing nearly 20,000 runs with 47 centuries.
Fondly known as Mr. 360 degree for his wide array of strokes, De Villiers played 156 matches for Bangalore in the IPL and scored 4, 491 runs. He is the second most runs scorer behind Virat Kohli for RCB.
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"I still believe that I have a role to play in SA cricket and also over there in the IPL with the Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB)," he was quoted as saying by Sunday Times.
"I have no idea what will come next but I will take it one day at a time and see. I have been looking after and mentoring some youngsters with potential and ability for the last few years. No one knows about it and hopefully, I can look back one day in the future knowing that I have made a big difference in the lives of a few players. That is my focus for now and I don't know if it's going to be professional or on a casual basis, but we will see where we go with that," he added.
AB de Villiers also opened up about the personal challenges that he faced in the last couple of years with the COVID-19 pandemic impacting lives.
“Having to go to the IPL twice last year where we had to deal with a lot of travelling restrictions, Covid-19 testing, missed and cancelled flights, and having to organise school for the kids was very challenging,” he said.
“I decided over the past few years that I am not going to travel without my kids any more and the split IPL really made it very complicated. Probably the biggest challenge was to stay sane, motivated and keeping the energy.
“I also picked up Covid-19 at some stage and I was really sick for 10 to 12 days and luckily I got through it. Those were the challenges and there were basic stresses of life with the pandemic floating around.”
The IPL was suspended midway last year after multiple COVID cases were detected inside the bio-bubble in India. The remaining games were later organised in UAE.
“By a long way, the travelling arrangements and the IPL have been the biggest challenge this year and finding that energy to still want to be the best in the world was difficult,” De Villiers said.
The Proteas batting genius also spoke about the factors that led to him calling time on his professional cricket career.
"I found myself on the park where scoring runs and doing well for the team didn't really match with everything that goes with it anymore and that’s where the balance started leading towards hanging my gloves up," AB de Villiers remarked.
"I have never been the guy who is going to push every single bit of energy of my ability and my cricketing skill, I have always played for the enjoyment of the game. And the minute that sort of started going down, I knew it was time for me to move on," he concluded.
(With PTI inputs)
