The International Cricket Council (ICC) on Monday (September 12) named the winners of the ICC Player of the Month awards for August. The award, introduced in January this year, recognizes the best performances from both male and female cricketers across all forms of international cricket.
In the men’s category, England skipper Joe Root was crowned the ICC Player of the Month for his stellar showing in the recently-concluded Test series against India. Root pipped India speedster Jasprit Bumrah and Pakistan pacer Shaheen Afridi to win the award.
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The right-hander slammed three centuries in as many Tests against India in August. While the England captain smashed 64 and 109 in the first Test at Trent Bridge, he scored 180* and 33 in the second game at Lord’s before hitting 121 in the third Test at Headingley.
“With the expectation and responsibility on his shoulders as the captain, I was really impressed with how he led from the front with the bat, and become the number one ranked Test batter in the world,” said former South Africa all-rounder JP Duminy, one of the panellists in the ICC Voting Academy.
In the women’s category, Ireland Eimear Richardson bagged the prestigious award, seeing off tough competition from teammate Gaby Lewis and Thailand’s Nattaya Boochatham.
Richardson played a huge role in Ireland's three wins out of four in the ICC Women’s T20 World Cup Europe Qualifier in August. She finished the tournament with seven wickets at an economy rate of 4.19 and aggregated 76 runs with the bat, which led her to win the Player of the Tournament award.
“It was very exciting to be nominated for the ICC Women’s Player of the Month for August and to now be voted as the winner is just so amazing and humbling,” Richardson said.
“It was great to contribute to overall team performances at the European Qualifiers and hopefully we have done enough to make the next stage and compete on a global level again.”
She also received rich praise from Pommie Mbangwa of the ICC Voting Academy. “What an amazing and important contribution in a tournament that is important to all the teams,” he said.
“What any team wants is for players to stand up at critical times and Eimear's contributions with bat and ball have come at the right time, been consistent and particularly significant.”
(With ICC inputs)
