Dewald Brevis was rewarded for an outstanding U19 World Cup campaign with a lucrative Indian Premier League deal, writes SIMON BORCHARDT  in SportsClub magazine.

AB de Villiers’ popularity knows no bounds in India, so when the Proteas legend announced his retirement from all cricket last November, including the Indian Premier League, it was met with great disappointment by millions of fans.

De Villiers had played in the lucrative T20 franchise tournament for the Delhi Daredevils (now known as the Capitals) from 2008 to 2010 and then the Royal Challengers Bangalore from 2011 to 2021. In 157 matches for RCB, he scored 4 522 runs at a strike rate of 158.33 and is their second-highest run-scorer of all time, behind India’s Virat Kohli.

However, while AB has left the IPL stage, ‘Baby AB’ – as Dewald Brevis is known – will enter it when the 2022 tournament begins on 26 March.

On 12 February, the 18-year-old made his senior provincial debut for the Titans in a T20 Challenge match against the Knights and was bought for 3 Indian crore (R6-million) by the Mumbai Indians. It is the IPL team his mother Yolanda has supported for years (his father Okker has always cheered for the Kolkata Knight Riders and his elder brother Reinardt for the Chennai Super Kings).

The amount Brevis was bought for came as a surprise – he fetched the fifth-highest price of the 10 South Africans sold at the auction – but the fact he was picked up by an IPL franchise was not.

Brevis had recently broken the record for the most runs scored in a single U19 World Cup tournament, with 506 in six innings at an average of 84.33. He scored two centuries (104 against Uganda and 138 against Bangladesh) and three half-centuries that included two nineties. Importantly, from an IPL auction perspective, he made 65 in the Junior Proteas’ opening match against India, where he drew comparisons on social media to De Villiers’ batting style and mannerisms at the crease.

That is not coincidental, as De Villiers confirmed after the match.

‘I know Dewald very well. I have been his mentor for about two years where I help him with his batting and his attitude towards cricket,’ he told Netwerk24. ‘We have done quite a few sessions together in the indoor nets. I always invited him for one-on-one sessions when I was preparing for the IPL, then I threw balls at him and he at me. I have also been to his house. I worked with him there and met his parents.’

Brevis and De Villiers both attended Affies (Afrikaanse Hoër Seunskool) in Pretoria, with the former just 14 years old and in Grade 9 when making his 1st XI debut.

Brevis had a fanboy moment when he asked De Villiers if they could take a photo together at a Pretoria restaurant and he later got his number when the Proteas batsman came to Affies to talk to the pupils.

‘During lockdown, I contacted him and I asked him for some advice and he always made time to reply to me,’ Brevis told ESPNcricinfo. ‘I like the way he explains cricket. He keeps it simple.’

Brevis said De Villiers had given him tips on his batting approach, including ‘how to get your head in a better position when you are facing and keeping both your shoulders open’ as well as the secret to ‘developing a feeling for the game’.

One person who is not a fan of the Brevis-De Villiers comparison is Affies’ head of cricket Deon Botes, whose long stint at the school covered both their high school careers.

‘I think Dewald will play for South Africa if he carries on in the way he is, but I’m worried about the AB thing because it puts pressure on him,’ Botes said. ‘If he can be the best Dewald Brevis he can be, I do think he will play for South Africa one day and he will bat in the top order.’

However, ‘Baby AB’ is likely to stick for a while and be chanted more than once by Mumbai supporters this year.

WATCH: Dewald Brevis’ first IPL net session

The biggest South African winner at the auction was Proteas fast bowler Kagiso Rabada, who after not being retained by the Delhi Capitals (they opted for Anrich Nortje instead) was bought for 9.25 crore (R18.6m) by the Punjab Kings.

To put that into context, if the 26-year-old plays the maximum number of matches in an IPL season (17) and bowls four overs in each, he will earn around R45,600 per delivery. If his team doesn’t reach the playoffs, and he bowls his full allocation of overs in every league-stage match, that figure will increase to around R55,300.

Next on the list of highest-earning South Africans is former Proteas skipper Faf du Plessis, who spent eight seasons with the Chennai Super Kings and played a big role in their title win last year, scoring 86 off 59 balls in the final against Kolkata. The 37-year-old was bought for R14.1m (7 crore) by the Royal Challengers Bangalore and immediately tipped as a possible captain with Kohli having relinquished the role after the 2021 tournament. Could Du Plessis be the man to lead RBC to their first IPL title in 15 attempts?

Proteas wicketkeeper-batsman Quinton de Kock, who was dropped for the Mumbai Indians’ last two matches of the 2021 tournament, got picked up by new IPL franchise the Lucknow Super Giants for R13.6m (6.75 crore). Marco Jansen is also moving on from Mumbai, where he spent his debut IPL season, to join the Sunrisers Hyderabad. The 21-year-old left-arm fast bowler will earn R8.4m (4.2 crore) for two months’ work.

ALSO READ: Jansen on fast track to success

The other new IPL team, the Gujarat Titans, bought the big-hitting David Miller, formerly of the Rajasthan Royals, for R6m (3 crore), while top order batsman Aiden Markram, who played six times for the Punjab Kings at the end of 2021’s IPL, will join Jansen at the Sunrisers after being sold for R5.2m (2.6 crore). Dwaine Pretorius (Chennai Super Kings) and Lungi Ngidi (Delhi Capitals) both went for R1m (50 lakh).

The most notable Proteas player to go unsold was Tabraiz Shamsi, who was ranked No 2 in the T20I bowling rankings at the time of the auction. The fact that he is a specialist spinner who doesn’t contribute much with the bat would have counted against him as well as the fact there are so many Indian spinners for franchises to choose from.

Other Proteas players to miss out on a big pay day were Zubayr Hamza, Heinrich Klaasen, Keshav Maharaj, Janneman Malan, Andile Phehlukwayo and Dwaine Pretorius.

– This article first appeared in SportsClub magazine. How to subscribe.