Former Proteas captain Faf du Plessis bares his soul in his book 'Faf: Through Fire'

Former Proteas captain Faf du Plessis bares his soul in his book Faf: Through Fire, which is more about his journey about leadership, relationships he made in cricket, being vulnerable and less about the game itself.

Du Plessis, whose successful international career spanned more than a decade and includes 69 Tests, 143 ODIs and 50 T20s, retired from Test cricket last year to focus on the shortest format of the game.

“A few people have asked me over the years if I would be interested in writing a book and I have always said no,” he told TimesLIVE before the book launch on Saturday.

“But when the lockdown started, everyone was frustrated because of not being able to do what they usually do, and for me that was cricket. I said let me have a full crack at this thing of writing a book and I became so obsessed.

“I was writing stories out of books and notes that I have compiled throughout my career. I was sitting until the early hours of the morning writing about my journey.

“It almost became an obsession for me and I suppose that’s what we do in sports. We become obsessed with something and then you put everything you have [into it]. I made so many notes.

“I got to a point where I said to my wife, what I am going to do with all these notes that I have compiled because if something happens, everything is gone. I got them into a cloud, put all that information into a laptop. I said to myself this is very interesting, I have so many stories to tell here.”

Du Plessis, who will captain the Joburg Super Kings during the inaugural edition of the SA20 in January, explains that the book is more about leadership and relationships that shaped him during his career.

“In terms of the book, most of it is about my journey in leadership, everything I learnt from all the people I have worked with during my time with the Proteas and around the world.

“A lot of the book is around leadership and relationships that have shaped me to be a better person or a better leader. And then I go into something like culture which is something really close to my heart.

“I have been very lucky enough to be part of the Proteas culture for a very long time because we are unique. I found that story to be beautiful and we needed to talk about team culture and what it represents.

“The other angle of the book is that at some stages I was very vulnerable, so I really bare my soul and this is me completely. The last part of the book would be self-growth that happened to me and I explain every story.

“There are also some beautiful cricket stories to top it off, but this is not a cricket book. I didn’t want to be talking about batting, bowling, fielding, series wins and stuff like that. I wanted it to be a lot deeper than that, I used some cricket stories that are interesting but it is not up to the point where I talk about the runs that I scored and stuff like that.”