The International Cricket Council announced the prestigious ICC Awards of the Decade on 28th December, which recognize the best players across Cricket over the past 10 years.
Indian captain and batting prodigy Virat Kohli was awarded the Sir Garfield Sobers Award for ICC Male Cricketer of the Decade while Australian all rounder Ellyse Perry was announced as the recipient of the Rachael Heyhoe-Flint Award for ICC Female Cricketer of the Decade.
Kohli has scored a whopping 20,396 runs in all forms of international cricket during the time period, which is more than any other cricketer. He was also awarded the winner of the ICC Cricketer of the Year in both 2017 and 2018.
Meanwhile, Ellyse Perry has scored 4,349 runs with four centuries and has taken 213 wickets in all international cricket during the past 10 years – which was also the most wickets taken by any player. She was also awarded the Rachael Heyhoe Flint Award for leading Women’s Cricketer in 2017 and 2019.
Virat Kohli bagged another award of the ICC Men’s ODI Cricketer of the Decade while Australian cricketer Steve Smith was announced as the winner of the ICC Men’s Test Cricketer of the Decade. He scored 7,040 runs in 69 Tests in the period at an average of 65.79 with 26 centuries.
Afghan cricketer Rashid Khan was awarded the ICC Men’s T20I Cricketer of the Decade award, for taking a whopping 89 wickets at an average of just 12.62 with an economy rate of a mere 6.14 runs per over in 48 matches during the decade.
Former Indian captain and wicketkeeper Mahendra Singh Dhoni was awarded the ICC Spirit of Cricket Award of the Decade, for his gesture of calling back former England batsman Ian Bell following a disputable runout at a test match in Trent Bridge in 2011. Bell on 137* was run out following an erroneous assumption that the ball had reached the boundary and gone for four, with Abhinav Mukund breaking the stumps while Bell wandered off to talk to his batting partner Eoin Morgan on the other side of the pitch.
Here is the list of the winners:
- Virat Kohli wins the Sir Garfield Sobers Award for ICC Male Cricketer of the Decade
- Ellyse Perry wins the Rachael Heyhoe-Flint Award for ICC Female Cricketer of the Decade
- Steve Smith is ICC Men’s Test Cricketer of the Decade
- Virat Kohli is ICC Men’s ODI Cricketer of the Decade
- Ellyse Perry is ICC Women’s ODI Cricketer of the Decade
- Rashid Khan is ICC Men’s T20I Cricketer of the Decade
- Ellyse Perry is ICC Women’s T20I Cricketer of the Decade
- Kyle Coetzer is ICC Men’s Associate Cricketer of the Decade
- Kathryn Bryce is ICC Women’s Associate Cricketer of the Decade
- MS Dhoni wins ICC Spirit of Cricket Award of the Decade
This was the first time that cricket fans from across the world were invited to vote for the winners. The nominees for each of the award categories were determined by the Awards Nominations Committee which included journalists, statisticians, analysts, former cricketers, and broadcasters from all across the globe.
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