Faf: Through Fire

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It showed how team leadership, management, and environment are vital for the players, and provides a detailed perspective about it through his experiences. The focus on soft skills drove Du Plessis to interact with players new to the team environment through regular coffee and meals. Owen Eastwood, a world-renowned performance coach from New Zealand, who worked extensively with the South African team on its team culture, and formed a partnership with Du Plessis when he was appointed captain, attested to the effectiveness of combining a human-centred approach with the technical skills. Once du Plessis learned to channel his energy more positively, he was able to appreciate De Villiers’ prodigious talent to the extent that he became his most vocal supporter.

There is the public persona-the tattooed, fashion-conscious, mentally tough, immensely popular and yet, at times, misunderstood Du Plessis.The emphasis, Du Plessis wrote, was on ensuring that players understood that their value to the team environment was beyond their performances on the cricket field. Du Plessis understood the impact of social media on a player’s mental health after he, and his family, received death threats following South Africa’s loss to New Zealand in the quarter-final of the 2011 World Cup. He also takes you behind the scenes into the locker room and explains what happened during some of the most controversial moments in cricket during his career, from Zipgate, Mintgate, Sandpapergate and the 2015 World Cup Semi Final selection controversy.

Upon concluding Faf: Through Fire, it would be hard not to reflect on the degree of vulnerability that Du Plessis displays. I have enjoyed and profited greatly from Faf's reflections and am inspired to take these insights into my personal, professional, and sporting life. Throughout the book, Du Plessis insists that South African teams are at their strongest when leaders pay attention to soft skills in conjunction with hard skills.It gives good insight to the behind the scenes and politics that we don't see on screen and dives into what it's like to not only play for the Proteas but what it's like to lead the Proteas during a rather difficult time in South African cricket and sports in general. Although the book gets a little repetitive at times and loses the grip, it was overall an interesting read, that keeps hooked till the end. Du Plessis adds, “I couldn’t expect Mark to prioritise soft skills and relationships in the way I did.