Rating the last five South African Test captains
South Africa have been one of the most successful Test teams over the past two and a half decades and although it must be said that most of their success had been down to the fact that they have almost always had a superb team, the contributions of the captain cannot be completely discounted.
Since the fall of their charismatic leader Hansie Cronje, South Africa have had exactly 5 full-time Test captains and they have had varying levels of success over the past 17 years.
Here is a look at how they stack up against each other.
#5 AB de Villiers
For all intents and purposes, it was thought that AB de Villiers would go on to become one of the greatest South African captains simply because of the fact that he was the best batsmen in the team. He had been the team's one-day international captain and had led South Africa to the semi-final of the 2015 World Cup in Australia.
Around that time, he became a reluctant Test player and by extension, a reluctant captain. However, when Hashim Amla resigned from the captaincy in January 2016 after the draw in the 2nd Test of the 4 match series against England at Cape Town, De Villiers was made the captain.
De Villiers' stint as the captain got off to the worst possible start at Johannesburg as England won the Test by 7 wickets. After England had secured a 10 run first innings lead, South Africa crashed to 83 all out as they had no answer to Stuart Broad (6/17 in 12.1 overs) and the captain himself scored a duck.
However, with the series gone, South Africa won the fourth Test by 280 runs to restore some pride. De Villiers has captained in 3 matches in total and recorded 2 victories. He won't be remembered in South Africa's captaincy hall of hame, unfortunately.