Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) announced their new captain for the upcoming season of the Indian Premier League on Saturday. South Africa's Faf du Plessis will be the new captain of RCB. He takes over the reins from Virat Kohli who led the side from 2013-2021. Kohli announced his decision to step down as RCB captain last year.
Faf du Plessis was speaking at a virtual media interaction, on the sidelines of the RCB captain-launch event. He went on to talk about how important Virat Kohli is for RCB.
"His (Kohli) performance as a cricket player has been probably one of the greatest, so huge respect for what he's done not only with the bat in his hand but also in captaincy perspective, he's changed Indian cricket," Du Plessis said as quoted by PTI.
Du Plessis spoke about how Kohli changed the Indian side during his tenure and made the side more fit and aggressive. "I've seen that happen over time. Playing against India for so long, I could see that shift, his leadership footprint has brought in the Indian team -- a competitive, fit Indian team that was fighting fire with fire as no Indian team ever did before.
"He's got an extremely strong leadership style and that rubs off obviously on players underneath him and that is something that we would still need," du Plessis said.
South Africa's legendary batsman, Mr. 360, AB De Villiers has decided to retire from cricket. 2021 was his last year for RCB. Du Plessis also said spoke about his former South Africa teammate.
He said, "It's huge shoes to fill in. There is no cricketer in the world that will try to fill in AB's shoes. Those shoes are too big. I've got big feet but they're never going to match AB's feat. I wouldn't even try, he's an absolute great of the game," Du Plessis said of his former South African teammate."