Steyn leaves de Villiers out of his best XI

South African fast bowler Dale Steyn recently made a team of 11 players he has played with and against. One would have expected a plethora of stars in the lineup, but as it turned out, the only non South African Cricketers to make this lineup were former Sri Lankan wicketkeeper Kumar Sangakkara and Australian fast bowler Brett Lee. The rest of the greats in the team were all his countrymen.

A tweet by Cricket South Arica said that the team included Steyn’s school bowling partner, best friend, and his former club captain.

A notable omission from Steyn’s XI is AB de Villiers, with whom he played most of his international matches with and was considered among the batsmen in the world throughout his international career.

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Surprisingly, despite playing so much International Cricket against India and playing in the IPL since it’s inception, Steyn’s XI did not have any Indian Cricketers in it.

Steyn picked his former South African captain Graeme Smith and Kumar Sangakkara as his openers, followed by Jacques Kallis at 4, Jonty Rhodes at 5, and current South African wicketkeeper batsman Quinton de Kock at 6. Allan Donald, Brett Lee and former left arm spinner Paul Harris completed his fast bowling armoury.

Dale Steyn’s best XI:
Graeme Smith
Kumar Sangakkara
Dave Hawken
Jacques Kallis
Jonty Rhodes
Quinton de Kock
Bret Bargiachi
Peter Lombard
Brett Lee
Paul Harris
Allan Donald

Steyn, like many other cricketers, has been active on the social media platform Twitter as all sporting events have been halted due to the novel pandemic termed as COVID-19. The last time Steyn was seen in action was for the Virat Kohli-led Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) in IPL 2020, which has been suspended for an indefinite period due to the deadly virus.