Samson had become the face of RR, having spent 11 years across two stints with the franchise. Ravindra Jadeja and Sam Curran joined RR as a part of the trade that saw him go to Chennai.
“If I look at the IPL and the iconic teams we see around the league, all of them have one marquee Indian player in common — someone who has been the face of the franchise for a period of time, (such as) Rohit Sharma, MS Dhoni, Virat Kohli. Sanju Samson, for me, was that guy at Rajasthan Royals,” du Plessis told JioHotstar.
“Yes, he’s of a newer generation, but he had become the face of that franchise. If I think of Rajasthan Royals, I think Sanju Samson. So, the fact that they’ve lost that face is a massive thing for the fans, for the IPL, and for the tournament, because he’s played such a big role there,” added du Plessis.
He said Samson’s departure would place added responsibility on Yashasvi Jaiswal, who had the freedom to play his natural game alongside the former RR skipper.
“The thing with Yashasvi Jaiswal is that he’s had Sanju Samson, who has been such a huge, consistent performer within that batting line-up. When you have that consistency of runs from Sanju, it allows you to play your game,” du Plessis said.
“Now, you take that away, all of a sudden, people will look at him with more responsibility. For a player like him, you don’t want him thinking about responsibility. You want him thinking, ‘I want to take the game on. I want to hit as many sixes as possible’.”
“There’s a learning curve that’s going to come into his career this season, ‘Am I true to the game that I’ve always played, or do I take up the senior player role to score the bulk of the runs?’ So it’ll be interesting to see how that goes. I think he’ll still play in the way that he does. It would be silly not to, because he’s such an attacking player.”
(With PTI inputs)