On Wednesday, the Indian skipper, Virat Kohli along with the women’s team’s openers, Smriti Mandhana were named the Leading Cricketer of the year by the Wisden Cricketers’ Almanack.
Kohli has been named as the Leading Cricketer in the World for an unprecedented third year in a row by the 2019 edition of Wisden Cricketers’ Almanack while this Mandhana getting this award for the first time. Rashid Khan, the Afghanistan leg-spinner, was named the Leading Twenty20 Cricketer for the second year in a row.
The Indian skipper was also picked as one of the five Wisden Cricketers of the year, along with Tammy Beaumont, Jos Buttler, Sam Curran, and Rory Burns. According to the reports in ESPNCricinfo, this is a list he has not been featured in before because Wisden lists “excellence in, or influence on, the previous English summer are the major criteria for inclusion as a Cricketer of the Year”.
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The announcement of the same was done by one of the editors of Wisden, Lawrence Booth.
Virat Kohli is also @WisdenAlmanack’s leading cricketer in the world, for the third year in a row. Smriti Mandhana wins the women’s award, and Rashid Khan the T20 award.
— Lawrence Booth (@the_topspin) April 10, 2019
Wisden has been listing out Cricketers of the Year since 1889 and it is considered as one of the more prestigious awards in the game of cricket. Virat has been able to win the award for the third straight year after a supremely successful year in 2018 where he amassed as many as 2735 runs across the three formats. He was also in top form during the tour of England, the only country he had not done well in before. In the five Tests, he made 593 runs at an average of 59.3, despite India losing the series 4-1.
Mandhana, the Leading Women’s Cricketer of the Year, scored 669 and 662 runs in ODIs and T20Is during the course of 2018. Her run in England’s Women’s Super League was spectacular as she piled up 421 runs at an astounding strike rate of 174.68, including a T20 century.
