After a stunning year in both Test and ODI cricket, England all-rounder Ben Stokes has won the Sir Garfield Sobers Trophy for the world player of the year. Stokes, who kept his nerve to smash an unbeaten 84 in the final against New Zealand, amassed 719 runs and bagged 12 wickets in 20 ODIs during the voting period. He was sensational in Test cricket as well - the all-rounder scored 821 runs and took 22 wickets in 11 Tests. The highlight of this year was an unbeaten 135 to win a nail-biting Ashes thriller in Leeds.
“It is quite flattering to win the Sir Garfield Sobers Trophy for the ICC Men’s Cricketer of the Year. The past 12 months have been incredible for England cricket and to lift the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup for the first time was our greatest achievement,” said Ben Stokes after bagging the award.
Australia pace spearhead Pat Cummins bagged the Test Player of the Year award while India opener and vice-captain in limited-overs cricket Rohit Sharma won the ODI Player of the Year in other major men’s ICC awards. Young India seamer Deepak Chahar won the T20I Performance of the Year, while Australia’s young batting sensation Marnus Labuschagne was named the Emerging Cricketer of the Year. Scotland’s Kyle Coetzer is the Associate Cricketer of the Year.
“I would like to thank the ICC for giving me this award and the BCCI for giving me the opportunity to represent the country. It is great to be recognised in this fashion. We are very happy with the way we performed as a team in 2019. We could have done better but we have a lot of positives and a lot to look forward to in 2020,” Rohit Sharma said after receiving the honour.
{{/usCountry}}“I would like to thank the ICC for giving me this award and the BCCI for giving me the opportunity to represent the country. It is great to be recognised in this fashion. We are very happy with the way we performed as a team in 2019. We could have done better but we have a lot of positives and a lot to look forward to in 2020,” Rohit Sharma said after receiving the honour.
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ICC Chief Executive Manu Sawhney congratulated the winners of the awards this year and wished them all the best for the future.
“On behalf of the ICC, I would like to congratulate all of the individual 2019 award winners as well as those players named in the ICC Teams of the Year.
“The awards celebrate the world’s best cricketers and this has undoubtedly been an extraordinary year for men’s cricket. The highlight of course was the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup 2019 that ended in such dramatic fashion. Ben Stokes was, of course in the midst of all the action during the event from that quite incredible catch at the Oval right through to that epic final at Lord’s and is a very deserving winner of the Sir Garfield Sobers Trophy.”
(With ICC inputs)