SA20 2024

‘I felt sad when I was not picked in the auction – Temba Bavuma on not getting picked for the SA 20 League

The Captain of South Africa in the shorter formats, Temba Bavuma has said he is hurt and sad after he wasn’t taken in by any team in the recently finished SA20 auction. The 32-year-old said he was wanting to play a role in the newly-formed league in South Africa but was left in the dark when no team wanted to bid for him.

“I felt down when I wasn’t picked in the auction. I’d be lying if I said that I didn’t have any feelings of disappointment. I certainly was expecting to get a role in the tournament. And it’s not just myself, its family as well who are so disappointed,” Bavuma said after going unsold at the auction.

The SA20 League auction took place at the Cape Town International Convention Centre in South Africa. A total of six teams, namely, Durban’s Super Giants, Joburg Super Kings, MI Cape Town, Paarl Royals, Pretoria Capitals, and Sunrisers Eastern Cape took part in the auction.

The highest buy of the auction was 22-year-old Tristan Stubbs, who was picked up by Sunrisers Eastern Cape for 9.2 million South African Rand. The second and third biggest buys were Rilee Rossouw, for whom Pretoria Capitals shelled out 6.9 million South African Rand, and Marco Jansen, who was picked by Sunrisers Eastern Cape for 6.1 million South African Rand.

The low point of the auction was that no bids were received from any of the six teams for either Temba Bavuma or Dean Elgar who lead South Africa in the limited overs format and the Test format respectively. It was a bit of let down that no one wanted to take two of South Africa’s charismatic leaders.

Temba Bavuma had got a call of support from the current South Africa coach Mark Boucher who said,

“Temba is our leader, we back him 100% and you can see the energy around him, the guys understand the situation he is going through,” Boucher said.