Picture Credit: BCCI/IPL
It was a moment of pure joy and bliss for the Chennai Super Kings as the team lifted their fourth title on Friday after handing the Kolkata Knight Riders a defeat of 27 runs. While most of the Chennai players were calm and composed with their celebrations on the field, they were immensely satisfied with the results especially in the way the Men in Yellow bounced back from a disastrous run in IPL 2020.
Post the match while Cricket South Africa (CSA) congratulated Chennai Super Kings' Lungi Ngidi for playing a part in CSK's IPL win, they did not even mention the names of former South Africa captain Faf du Plessis and veteran spinner Imran Tahir. The same did not go down well with several netizens and legendary Proteas pacer Dale Steyn, who was quick to notice the act from Cricket South Africa on social media.
Steyn pointed out that Faf and Tahir had not even announced their retirement from international cricket and yet were not even deemed worthy of a mention in a social media post despite years of service to the national cricket team. "Disgusting," Steyn termed the behaviour from CSA.
Check out Steyn and Faf's comment on CSA's post here:
Later when Cricket South Africa blocked the comments section on the post, Steyn was once again the first to voice his opinion. He advised the South African board to delete the post and add the names of all the names involved in CSK's record title win to save themselves some embarrassment. More shocking is the fact that Faf was the Player of the Match in IPL 2021 final and yet was ignored from the post.
"CSA now blocked the comments section. Here’s some advice. Do the right thing. Delete the post and add all the men involved, save yourself the embarrassment and ridicule," Steyn tweeted. The post was later deleted by the board.
Check it out here:
Both Faf and Tahir have also not been named in South Africa's T20 World Cup squad. While the selectors are perhaps looking beyond Tahir, Du Plessis was not even considered since he had not been consistently available for selection.
"Faf has got a wonderful record but we wanted to be consistent in the selection and this is the group of players we have gone with. When you're working with free agents, you have to come together that works for both the team and the free agents, they're obviously attracted to various leagues and then the squad has its own requirements on how they build towards a World Cup," Selection convener Victor Mpitsang was quoted as saying by News24.