Max Mashman | 12:00am BST 20 July 2025
What does it take to grow to be a legendary cricketer? You want uncooked expertise, excessive dedication and, after all, an amazing persona. A little bit of luck additionally helps. Many well-known cricket gamers have a mixture of those traits. Solely a handful have all of them. One participant particularly who ticks all these containers and has an enormous quantity of ability and dedication to the game is AB de Villiers, a South African former skilled cricketer identified for his batting abilities.
All through his profession, AB de Villiers attracted an enormous following and broke many data. A lot of his followers loved watching his matches; a few of them took issues a step additional and positioned bets on his success. What makes on-line betting for cricket nice is that there’s a variety of occasions to guess on and fairly just a few several types of wagers you possibly can place. Those that backed AB de Villiers would have actually had some profitable bets!
Regardless that AB de Villiers formally retired from skilled cricket on 23 Could 2018, his legacy continues to impress folks to this present day. It additionally evokes younger folks to take up cricket and grow to be skilled gamers. Listed below are 15 details about AB de Villiers and his extraordinary cricket profession.
Private Particulars
AB de Villiers was born Abraham Benjamin de Villiers on 17 February 1984 in Pretoria, South Africa. He grew up along with his mother and father and two older brothers. His father, a health care provider who performed rugby union, inspired him to take up a sport, which, after all, ended up being cricket. After enjoying for the South Africa U19 workforce, he made his skilled debut enjoying for the Titans within the 2003/4 season.
Married Life
AB de Villiers is fortunately married with three youngsters: two sons and one daughter. He started courting Danielle Swart in 2007 and proposed 5 years later in 2012 on the Taj Mahal. They married the next yr.
Nicknames
AB de Villiers earned the nickname Mr 360 due to his means to hit photographs with each precision and ease regardless of the place he was on the sector. He’s additionally been often called Superman because of his unimaginable efficiency in matches.
Most Catches in a Season
Within the 2016 season, AB de Villiers took no fewer than 19 catches, which was a fee of 1.187 catches per innings. Nobody has overwhelmed this file, however two different gamers, Riyan Parag and Ruturaj Gaikwad, have come shut with 17 catches every.
Social Media Recognition
Like many different high-profile sports activities stars, AB de Villiers is energetic on social media. The retired skilled cricketer is presently probably the most adopted South African with 30 million followers. He’s made 980 posts, a lot of which had been associated to cricket in a technique or one other. He additionally has accounts on Fb and X.Â
Quickest Fifties and Centuries
AB de Villiers held the file for the OCI quickest fifty for over 10 years from January 2015 to Could 2025 when Matthew Forde matched his file of 16 balls confronted. As for OCI quickest centuries, de Villiers’ file of 31 balls confronted stays unbeaten.
Batting Common
When he started his skilled cricket profession, AB de Villiers was a wicket-keeper-batter, although he most frequently performed as a batter, preferring the center order. He turned identified for his spectacular batting abilities and quite unorthodox actions. To this present day, he stays one among a small variety of batsmen to have a batting common of higher than 50 in each ODI and Take a look at cricket.
Maak Jou Drome Waar
In 2010, AB de Villiers and singer-songwriter Ampie du Preez, launched an album. Its title is Afrikaans for ‘Make Your Goals Come True’. There are 14 tracks, of which 9 are in Afrikaans and the remaining 5 are in English. They’re largely energy ballads about following your goals and being in love. The songs had been recorded from 2009 to 2010, and the album was launched on the Sony Music Africa label. AB de Villiers has additionally had a band known as The Cowboys.
2015 Cricket World Cup
Some would say that 2015 was the spotlight of AB de Villiers’ cricket profession. When he took half within the Cricket World Cup of that yr, he was one of many best-performing gamers. He ended up because the third-highest run scorer with a complete of 482 runs and did an excellent job of captaining the South Africa nationwide workforce. Nonetheless, he didn’t handle to make them victory as South Africa misplaced to New Zealand within the semi-final stage.
Worldwide Cricket Council Honours
All through his profession, AB de Villiers acquired many honours from the Worldwide Cricket Council (ICC) because of his abilities and expertise as a cricket participant. He was named ICC Males’s ODI Cricketer of the 12 months thrice (2010, 2014 and 2015) and was inducted into the ICC Corridor of Fame in 2024. He additionally gained ICC Males’s Take a look at Staff of the 12 months 5 occasions and ICC Males’s ODI Staff of the 12 months seven occasions.
Extra Awards
AB de Villiers earned a number of different prestigious honours throughout his profession. In each 2014 and 2015, in addition to being named ICC Males’s ODI Cricketer of the 12 months, he acquired the award for Cricket South Africa Cricketer of the 12 months. Then in 2022, he was inducted into the Royal Challengers Bengaluru Corridor of Fame. Throughout his time with this Indian Twenty20 cricket workforce from 2011 to 2021, he notched up 4,491 runs in 144 innings.Â
Different Sports activities
AB de Villiers has devoted a lot of his life to cricket, although he’s performed just a few different sports activities at numerous levels of his life. These embody hockey, rugby, golf and tennis, although he’s stated that cricket is the one one he was ever good at. He was thought-about for the nationwide hockey workforce at one level. For some time, he was stated to be an all-rounder who excelled at each sport he tried, although he clarified in his autobiography that this wasn’t the case.
Autobiography
Talking of his autobiography, it was launched in 2012 and has the easy title AB de Villiers – Autobiography. It’s properly rated on Amazon with a mean ranking of 4.5 out of 5 from 870 evaluations. As you’d count on, it tells the story of AB de Villiers’ early years {and professional} profession in his personal phrases. He additionally discusses his non secular beliefs and mentions that the Holy Bible is one among his favorite books.
Quantity 17 Jersey
All through his skilled cricket profession, AB de Villiers wore a jersey with the quantity 17 on it. He selected this quantity as a result of it was the day he was born and he thought-about it to be fortunate.Â
Friendship With Faf du Plessis
Faf du Plessis is one other South African cricketer who’s grow to be one of many sport’s prime gamers. The previous captain has been labelled probably the greatest midfielders and all-format batsmen in trendy cricket. He and AB de Villiers go means again as the 2 went to highschool collectively. Actually, after they had been each 15 they performed for the varsity’s cricket workforce.
