On Tuesday, The International Cricket Council announced the honours for 2019 in which the Australian all-rounder Ellyse Perry won the Rachael Heyhoe-Flint Award for the ICC Women’s Cricketer of the year and also she is the ICC Women’s ODI player for the year 2019. She has won the Rachael Heyhoe-Flint award second time in the last three years – the first as the inaugural winner in 2017. Perry showed her class throughout 2019 alongside opening partner and fellow award winner Alyssa Healy, who won the Women’s T20I Cricketer of the year.
She had a wonderful run in this year with both, bat and bowl. Her average from 12 ODI’s is 73.50 with 21 wickets from her side.
On winning these awards Perry said, “It’s an amazing honour and I’m a little bit shocked, given how many amazing performances there have been across the year. It’s amazing to be acknowledged and I do truly appreciate it. It’s a really nice way to finish this year on a personal note.”
The second biggest honour was taken away by the Australian wicket-keeper Alyssa Healy that is the T20I Cricketer of the year for the second year running. She has won the award for the second year running and entered the record books in October when she made 148* runs off just 61 balls against Sri Lanka. This is the highest score by a woman in T20Is. Her performances made her a clear winner again this year.
“I’m really pumped to be awarded the T20I cricketer of the year,” said Healy.
She added, “The Australian women’s team had a fantastic 12-month period and we played some really consistent T20 cricket. Whilst the individual award is really nice for me personally, I think it was great to see our team play so well throughout that 12-month period, especially leading into a home World Cup in 2020.”
Both Perry and Healy are also in the ODI and T20I teams of the year. They are accompanied by their captain Meg Lanning who has been named as skipper of both 50-over and 20-over side. With all the three big awards won by Australian women, they find themselves in something of a golden era.
The Australian women’s team is ranked no.1 in both the formats, and this makes them the favourites for the upcoming home T20I world cup. The World cup will start on 21 February and will end on 8 March 2020 in Australia.
It’s a huge honour to be named the captain of the ICC ODI and T20I teams of the year alongside some incredible players,” said Lanning.
Chanida Sutthiruang’s exceptional performances in the T20 world cup qualifiers 2019 made her the ICC’s Emerging Cricketer of the year. The 26-year-old right-arm pacer played outstanding cricket with the national side this year as they set a new record of 17 consecutive T20I wins. They won the quadrangular series which featured Ireland, Scotland, and the Netherlands.
After the awards were announced, Manu Sawhney the ICC chief executive commented, “On behalf of the ICC I would like to offer our sincere congratulations to Ellyse, Alyssa and Chanida on their well-dressed individual accolades as well as the other players who have made the teams of the year.”
Winners:
Rachael Heyhoe Flint Award for ICC Women’s Cricketer of the year- Ellyse Perry (Australia)
ICC Women’s ODI player of the year- Ellyse Perry (Australia)
ICC Women’s T20I player of the year- Alyssa Healy (Australia)
ICC Women’s emerging player of the year- Chanida Sutthiruang (Thailand)
ICC Women’s ODI Team of the year (in batting order):
1. Alyssa Healy (wk) – Australia
2. Smriti Mandhana – India
3. Tamsin Beaumont – England
4. Meg Lanning (c) – Australia
5. Stafanie Taylor – West Indies
6. Ellyse Perry – Australia
7. Jess Jonassen – Australia
8. Shikha Pandey – India
9. Jhulan Goswami – India
10. Megan Schutt – Australia
11. Poonam Yadav – India
ICC Women’s T20I Team of the year (in batting order):
1. Alyssa Healy (wk) – Australia
2. Danielle Wyatt – England
3. Meg Lanning (c) – Australia
4. Smriti Mandhana – India
5. Lizelle Lee – South Africa
6. Ellyse Perry – Australia
7. Deepti Sharma – India
8. Nida Dar – Pakistan
9. Megan Schutt – Australia
10. Shabnim Ismail – South Africa
11. Radha Yadav – India
Both the teams and annual women’s individual awards have been selected by the official voting academy, which took into consideration player performances throughout 2019.
(Source- ICC press release)
Loves all things female cricket
