AB de Villiers, arguably one of cricket’s greatest ambassadors, has brought down the curtains brought the curtains down on a glittering 14-year career on Wednesday. With 20,014 international runs (8765 in Tests, 9577 in ODIs and 1672 in T20Is) and 47 centuries across formats since making his debut as a 20-year-old in 2004, the South African batting colossus is up there with best batsmen in the game.
The blistering scores in shorter formats and patient innings in Tests have earned de Villiers a unique place in the statistical history books. He’s the only batsmen with an average of more than 50 and a strike rate of more than 100 in ODIs for players who’ve scored at least 3,000 runs.
Virat Kohli and Michael Bevan are the only two batsmen with an equally envious average, but neither one comes close in terms of strike rate. Kohli perhaps has a chance to succeed de Villiers, but he would really need to up the rate of scoring to catch up.
But what makes the South African special is his ability to adapt according to the format. As a Test player, he is one of the two South Africans with an average greater than 50 for batsmen who’ve scored at least 3,000 runs. Jacques Kallis dwarfs the rest with 55.3 and de Villiers inches over with 50.6.
Both are among the highest run scorers in the history of their country. With 8,765 runs from 114 Test matches, only Hashim Amla, Graeme Smith and Kallis are ahead of de Villiers.
The last ten years of de Villier’s Test career have been nothing short of spectacular. Among players who have a Test average greater than 50, only Amla has outscored him with a mammoth 7,940 runs to his 6,692. Though Alistair Cook and Michael Clarke have scored more, they’ve played many more matches.
The latter part of only Kumar Sangakarra’s career mirrors that of de Villiers, with both getting better with age.
Interestingly, de Villiers last Test series against Australia was his best. He averaged 71.16 for the series, and came away with four fifties and a century.
This remarkable consistency also translated into success in T20 cricket, especially the IPL.
De Villiers is arguably the Indian Premier League’s most consistent batsmen since the inception of the league. At an average of nearly 40 and strike rate of above 150, he’s battered bowling attacks every Indian summer. With about 3,943 runs during his 11 seasons, he’s the tenth highest run-scorer.
On all accounts, de Villiers could play at a level that very few could and played at that level till the end of his career. His retirement not only leaves a huge gap for the South African team, but a void that cricket will find hard to fill.