ICC T20 World Cup: AB de Villiers to come out of retirement? Mark Boucher reveals chat with former South Africa skipper

Former South Africa cricketer AB de Villiers (Source: Twitter)

South Africa head coach Mark Boucher has hinted at the possible return of AB de Villiers to the national side ahead of the ICC T20 World Cup 2021, which is scheduled to take place in India from October.

Notably, de Villiers announced his international retirement almost three years ago, however, the former South Africa captain has continued to play in T20 leagues across the world over the years and has displayed superlative form in the shortest format and his power-packed performances in the IPL 2020 for Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) had sparked the speculations of his return the South Africa cricket team for the T20 World Cup in 2020, which was postponed by an year due to COVID-19 pandemic.

Now, Boucher has revealed that the discussion to bring back AB de Villiers into international cricket is still on and he is going to have a chat with him after the end of IPL 2021.

“I did chat to him before he went to the IPL. The conversation is still very much open. AB, being the person he is, wants to perform very well at the IPL to prove to himself and everyone else that he is still a very key figure in world cricket and could dominate at that level,” Mark Boucher was quoted by iol.ca.za as saying.

Boucher also revealed that he is going to have a chat with AB de Villiers over the matter after IPL 2021. “I said to him: ‘Go do your thing, and I’ll give you a shout towards the back-end of the IPL.’ So that is where we are with him,” Mark Boucher further said.

Interestingly, ABD played a match-winning 48 runs off 27 balls against Mumbai Indians in the IPL 2021 opener and his innings ultimately helped Virat Kohli’s side to register a two-wicket win against the defending champions at Chepauk in Chennai.