Faf du Plessis called himself lucky to have learnt about captaincy from none other than great cricketing minds like MS Dhoni.
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Royal Challengers Bangalore captain Faf du Plessis called himself lucky to have learnt about captaincy from none other than great cricketing minds like MS Dhoni. Du Plessis, however, stated that he never aimed to emulate Dhoni, Stephen Fleming or Graeme Smith as a captain. In an RCB podcast, the South African veteran said that he learned a lot about leadership from Fleming when he got an opportunity to play for Chennai Super Kings in the 2011 season of the Indian Premier League as well.
“I got an opportunity to go to Chennai as a young-ish phase in my career. Stephen Fleming is one of the great leaders within the game, obviously, for New Zealand cricket also. The different aspect was him being a man manager, a guy who just works on relationships. And I go, Wow, that’s impressive,” said Faf du Plessis.
He continued: “During my first season at CSK, I was sitting next to him (Fleming) and just asked him questions about captaincy and leadership, just to learn as much as I can. And then you put MS on top of that, and you go, Wow, this guy’s tactically odd to read the game like this. And you go, Okay, he is impressive as a captain.”
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It is also noteworthy that MS Dhoni is one of the best captains in the history of the league where he led the team to the title four times after Rohit Sharma led Mumbai Indians – the team that won the title most of the time – five.
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“I think what was really good for me to go through was, even with all of that, the conviction that I am not going to be Graeme Smith as a captain, I’m not going to be Stephen Fleming as a captain, I’m not going to be MS Dhoni as a captain. In order for me to be true to who I am as a person, I need to be me. Because if you’re not being you, then people will see through it, maybe not when you’re doing well but definitely when you are under pressure, or underperforming, the real you will reveal itself,” Faf du Plessis concluded.
However, Faf du Plessis smashed 468 runs from 16 matches with 3 fifties, which also included the highest of 96, for Royal Challengers Bangalore during the 2022 edition of the Indian Premier League.
