Mark Boucher finds shades of MS Dhoni in Quinton de Kock

Mark Boucher reckons that South Africa ODI and T20I skipper Quinton de Kock has the potential to replicate MS Dhoni’s role in the national team. The southpaw has been in the thick of things after the Proteas’ disastrous campaign in the 2019 World Cup where they couldn’t make the semis. From there, De Kock has captained the South Africa team in the ODI and T20I format.

Recently, in the ODI series against England, he was given the leadership mantle in place of Faf du Plessis. After eking out a 1-1 series in the 50-over format, De  Kock is set to captain the Proteas in the three-match T20I series, scheduled to start on February 12 at the Buffalo Park in East London.

As per Boucher, Quinton has the ingredients to replicate what Dhoni has done for the Men in Blue at the highest level. “A lot of people questioned [MS] Dhoni when he was captaining India and he had a great captaincy record,” Boucher was quoted as saying in ESPNcricinfo.

Quinny enjoys being in the game: Boucher

In the ODI series, De Kock became the leading run-scorer with a century in Cape Town followed by a fifty at the Wanderers in Johannesburg. The left-hander was subsequently adjudged the Player of the Series. Boucher described De Kock as someone, who wants to be out there in the middle.

“Quinny enjoys being in the game. Sometimes he sits in the dressing room during Test-match cricket and he gets really irritated because he wants to be doing something all the time. I think he really enjoys it. The off-the-field stuff is the stuff that might get to him a bit. We’re going to have to help him in that regard. But certainly, on the field, he leads well,” he stated.

Boucher was also impressed by a few fielding changes De Kock made in Cape Town and Johannesburg, resulting in the dismissals of Eoin Morgan and Joe Root respectively. Boucher put forth his USP and believes that it can rub off positively on the South Africa team.

“We always knew that Quinny has got a very smart cricketing brain. He had a couple of different field placings which I thought were good and he was thinking out of the box. Quinny is unique and I think the uniqueness of him can work wonders in a dressing room like this because we’ve got a unique set-up as well,” Boucher added.