Rilee Rousseau Celebrates Rs 8-crore IPL Contract With South African Braai

South African batter Rilee Rousseau seems excited after securing an Rs 8-crore deal to join Punjab Kings for the upcoming season of the Indian Premier League (IPL). Rousseau was one of the top purchases at the mini-auction, held in Dubai on Tuesday. The Proteas cricketer celebrated his latest IPL contract with a plate full of delicacies.

In a post dropped on X (formerly Twitter), Rousseau was seen preparing a lekker South African braai, one kind of barbeque popular across African regions. In the case of the braai, the meat is roasted in camel-thorn wood instead of coal or gas. “Now this is how we celebrate after the auction with a lekker South African braai,” Rousseau wrote in the caption of the post.

Rilee Rousseau could not attract interest from any franchise in the first round of the auction. But his fortune took a U-turn in the accelerated round where a bidding war transpired between Delhi Capitals and Punjab Kings.

Rousseau featured at the auction with a base price of Rs 2 crore. After getting into the accelerated round, it hardly took him any time to reach the 5-crore mark. As DC finally surrendered, PBKS secured the signing of Rousseau, who is recognised as South Africa’s one of the top T20 players in recent times.

Rousseau represented Delhi Capitals in the last IPL but failed to make any impact. In his 9 appearances during the campaign, Rousseau aggregated a total of 209 runs at an average of below 30. He managed to record just one fifty in the tournament.

The 34-year-old made his IPL debut back in 2014 for Royal Challengers Bangalore. He stayed with the franchise for two seasons and got to play only five matches. Rousseau has already turned his back on international cricket. He donned the South African kit only for two years before bidding adieu to international cricket at the age of 26.

Rousseau has represented the Proteas in 36 ODIs and 29 T20Is, scoring 1239 and 767 runs respectively. However, he has remained actively involved in the sport. Apart from IPL, Rousseau features in several other franchise tournaments around the world.