5 undeserving recipients of 2016 ICC awards

Earlier today, the International Cricket Council announced the winners of the 2016 ICC awards. India’s R Ashwin ran away with the Sir Garfield Sobers Trophy for the ICC Cricketer of the Year and the ICC Test Cricketer of the Year award. South African opener Quinton de Kock was named the ICC ODI Cricketer of the Year while Bangladesh’s Mustafizur Rahman was named the ICC Emerging Cricketer of the Year.

ICC also announced the Test Team of the Year and the ODI Team of the Year, led by Alastair Cook and Virat Kohli respectively. Though people were questioning Kohli’s absence from the Test team, the Indian skipper’s numbers in the format in the 12-month period (14 September 2015 to 20 September 2016) failed to back up the claims by the fans. 

But, few deserving cricketers were not considered for the 2016 awards and few undeserving names ran away with the top prizes. The same can be said about the names that feature in the ICC Teams of the Year. Let us take a look at the undeserving names that feature in the ICC awards.

---

#1 Mustafizur Rahman

Bangladeshi pacer Mustafizur Rahman made a giant stride into international cricket by claiming back-to-back five-wicket hauls against a strong Indian batting order in his first two matches. Since then, there is no turning back for the Fizz as he became one of the important members of the Bangladeshi team.

Earlier today, he was awarded the ICC Emerging Cricketer of the Year. In the 12-month period that is taken into consideration, Mustafizur Rahman has played just 13 matches (3 ODIs and 10 T20Is) and ended up taking 27 wickets at an average of 11.74.

On the other hand, few players played more matches and performed consistently throughout. Kusal Mendis, who is the backbone of the Sri Lankan batting across all the three formats is one name that comes to our mind.

Apart from him, there are KL Rahul, who averages over 100 across the three formats in the given period and Jasprit Bumrah, who ended 2016 as the leading wicket-taker in T20Is and scalped a total of 37 wickets in 24 matches in his first year in International cricket.

Moreover, one name that stood out and deserved to be named as the ICC Emerging Cricketer of the Year ahead of Mustafizur is South Africa’s Kagiso Rabada. Both Rabada and Mustafizur made their debut almost at the same time and since then, Rabada’s numbers have been very impressive.

In the 12-month period given by the ICC, Rabada ended up second on the list of wicket-takers behind the Cricketer of the Year, R Ashwin. Rabada picked up 67 wickets in 32 matches across all the three formats at an average of just over 23.