South Africa batting star Herschelle Gibbs will play for Hyderabad in the inaugural Indian Premier League after the franchise paid $575,000 for his signature.

With Gibbs’ reputation for achieving the seemingly impossible, like when he scored 175 against Australia and helped South Africa reach a then one-day world record total of 438 to win and his six sixes in the 2007 World Cup, Hyderabad may just have captured a bargain.

Gibbs, who was left out of the Test squad to tour Bangladesh this month but still remains a key member of the Proteas one-day team, will line up along side fellow big hitters Shahid Afridi, Andrew Symonds, Adam Gilchrist and Scott Styris, making Hyderabad one of the potentially most feared teams in the eight-team league.