The International Cricket Council (ICC) on Tuesday announced the Player of the Month nominees for November 2021 in which women’s cricket saw nominations based on the halfway abandoned World Cup Qualifiers and series the teams played. Belonging to the three teams that qualified for the 2022 World Cup based on their rankings, Bangladesh’s Nahida Akter, Pakistan’s Anam Amin, and Hayley Matthews from West Indies were announced as the nominees.
Nahida Akter
Youngster Nahida Akter has led Bangladesh’s bowling attack on several occasions the most recent being the ODI series against Zimbabwe in Bulawayo followed by the World Cup Qualifiers. In the first of the three ODIs she finished with an outstanding spell of 3/2 with three maidens in 5.2 overs she bowled, getting the same number of wickets in the second match too, conceding 30 runs in 9.4 overs with two maidens. The last ODI saw her first five-wicket haul in WODI in which she gave away just 21 runs bowling the full quota of 10 overs including four maidens. Thus, helping her team get a clean sweep victory and sharing the Player of the Series award with her teammate, opener Murshida Khatun. Her performance was followed by the figure of 2/10 in a warmup match against the Netherlands, then 2/25 and 1/17 against Pakistan and Thailand respectively in the qualifiers but failed to take a wicket against the United States.
The nominees for #ICC Player of the Month are here.
Who has your vote? pic.twitter.com/N8zGXfkEGO
— Female Cricket (@imfemalecricket) December 8, 2021
Anam Amin
What Akter did for Bangladesh, Anam Amin has done for Pakistan. Leading the wicket-takers tally early last month while hosting West Indies in Karachi, Amin recorded her first WODI five-wicket haul in the first of the three ODIs itself. Amin gave 35 runs in her 10 over spell with two maidens in the match. In the second and the third ODI, she got a couple of wickets each giving 21 and 45 respectively, though the visitors got a clean sweep victory. Amin’s performance continued in the World Cup qualifiers where she took a wicket each in the warmup, then against Bangladesh and Thailand, ending up the abandoned qualifiers with the spell of 3/9 in 7 overs against the host, Zimbabwe.
Hayley Matthews
West Indies all-rounder Hayley Matthews who moved two places up to eight in the updated ICC Women’s all-rounder ranking announced on November 30, plays a crucial role for the Windies with both the bat and the ball. In the team’s tour to Pakistan, she took 3 wickets for 31 runs in the first of the three ODIs contributing 57 with the bat too. This was followed by a player of the match performance in the second one, finishing with the figure of 4/26 with 2 maidens in 9 overs and making 26 with the bat. In the last ODI, though she didn’t get a wicket, she fell one short of her half-century after getting caught on 49. Keeping up to her performance, in the warmup match against Thailand she made 57 with the bat and took a wicket giving just a single in the nine balls she bowled. In the only match the team played before the qualifiers were called off, Matthews bowled 3 maidens, finishing 2/20 in her 10 overs spell, and scoring 9 with the bat.
These talented women are nominated as the most deserving ones for the award for the month which saw a number of series taking place along with the Women’s Big Bash League (WBBL) and the World Cup Qualifiers.
The nominees for #ICC Player of the Month are here.
Who has your vote? pic.twitter.com/N8zGXfkEGO
— Female Cricket (@imfemalecricket) December 8, 2021
On the other hand, men’s cricket saw 2021 T20 World Cup player of the tournament Australia’s David Warner along with Black Caps bowler Tim Southee who was exceptional in the World Cup as well as on Kiwis tour to India, and Pakistan’s Abid Ali for his performance in the series against Bangladesh, as the November 2021 award nominee.
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