Quinton de Kock has been a run machine across formats for South Africa over the last decade and scored runs all over the globe. In the next big assignment of his career, Quinton de Kock will be leading Durban’s Super Giants in the inaugural SA20 League.
His exhilarating strokeplay coupled with the outstanding glovework has often drawn comparisons to the greats of the game like Adam Gilchrist, but interestingly, cricket wasn’t his first choice sport.
De Kock played a lot of baseball as a child and even contemplated moving to the United States to play the sport, but his father convinced him to pursue cricket. He made his mark at the junior level, scoring 284 runs in the 2012 ICC U19 World Cup.
Just a few days before his 21st birthday, De Kock marked his arrival on the international stage. He became the fifth batter in history to score three consecutive centuries in ODIs against India, also the youngest to do so.
Among South Africans, he was the fastest batter to score 1,000 runs in ODIs (joint-third overall) and as the years passed, the QDK phenomenon kept growing in stature. In a couple of years’ time, the southpaw was opening the innings for South Africa in ODIs and T20Is, coming in at the crucial No. 6 spot in Tests and became the first-choice keeper across all formats.
Quinton de Kock has scored 5,833 runs in ODIs at a strike rate of 96.03. Only five other batters - Virender Sehwag, AB de Villiers, Shahid Afridi, Brendon McCullum, David Warner - have scored more than 5,000 ODI runs at a strike rate north of 95 In the game’s history.
De Kock has found great success in his globetrotting T20 adventure. Most recently, he donned the blue of DSG’s sister franchise Lucknow Super Giants in the IPL and finished as the third-highest run-scorer in the tournament.
His best outing in the IPL, however, came with the Mumbai Indians when the franchise won back-to-back titles in 2019 and 2020. He was their leading run-scorer in the 2019 edition with 529 runs and followed it up with another 500-run campaign in 2020.
De Kock also represented Sunrisers Hyderabad, Delhi Capitals, Royal Challengers Bangalore, Barbados Royals, and Southern Brave (The Hundred) outside of South Africa.
Quinton de Kock has scored 8,497 runs in T20 cricket for club and country, at an average of 32.93 and a strike rate of 137.55. Among South Africans, only AB de Villiers and David Miller have scored more runs than De Kock in the shortest format. However, having just turned 30, the best is perhaps yet to come for the lad from Gauteng.
