End of season awards

[NZTailender]

Since it's the end of WCC I thought I'd do an all time (from the three seasons) and season 3 awards.

Starting with season 3, we'll have the limited overs awards first.
C Taylor was once again the best batsman in this format, confirming him as a dominator on the One Day circuit. J Bradshaw was the runner up with a superb season, while special mentions to R Beetson and R McLaren for being top notch innings finishers, the majority of their innings being not outs.

Bowling wise, newcomer T Gruggen picks up this award after taking 25 at 26.44. OD bowling was tough with runner up EP van Wyk one of few to have an average under 30. Saqlain Mushtaq took 24 wickets but was very expensive in doing so, going for 6.79 runs an over!

Combined with T20 performances, the Yorkshire One Day Player of the Season award goes to T Gruggen, his T20 performances netting him 6 wickets @ 13.17 and 31 wickets over the two formats at 23.87.


On to the First Class awards. There are quite a few contenders this season in a team that shook off it's under-performance tag for this format, taking the Division 2 First Class trophy.
The batsman of the year award goes to J Patel who shone in the number 3 position, nearly top scoring for the season despite missing two games with an injury. 1112 runs @ 65.41 with a top score of 234*, 2 double centuries, 2 centuries and 5 fifties is a sensational effort and it is only sad he will not be able to go on to greater heights with his abundant talent. Marvan Atapattu was the runner-up, with 1295 @ 56.30, 5 centuries and 4 fifties at the top of the order. He was picked up in the draft despite some teams thinking he was too old, and repaid the faith and then some. Special mention to R Beetson who scored 1073 runs at 51.10 in his debut season.

The FC bowler of the season was a two horse race, between a seasoned spinner and a draftee medium paced all-rounder. Saqlain Mushtaq again showed why he's one of the best bowlers to grace WCC with 60 wickets @ 27.57, with a best of 7-32, and he picks up the runner-up award for the season as he was outdone by the medium pace of all-rounder EP van Wyk, who took 65 wickets @ 22.60 in over a 100 less overs than Mushtaq. His best performance was 7-29 against Karachi and took a ten wicket haul.

There is really no question as to who was the FC player of the season, as EP van Wyk had an amazing all-round season, his 65 wickets @ 22.60 complemented by 636 runs @ 35.33 with 2 centuries, 1 fifty and a top score of 185*. His runner up is fellow all-rounder R McLaren, who didn't play 4 matches, managed 402 runs @ 44.67 and 37 wickets at 30.84 proving to be one of the integral players in the line up.

All-together, the Yorkshire Player of Season 3 award goes to, who would've guessed it, EP van Wyk! Providing to be essential with the ball in both forms, and doing a grand job with the bat in FC, he was the clear choice for this award. His runner up was the veteran S Mushtaq, who kept up his wicket taking habits, finishing in the overall top wicket taker column for the league as well.

[Simon]

Good job mate.

The WCC Season 3 awards will be tomorrow for those interested, this will be the final part of WCC and I'll then ask James to archive this forum in the next few days.

[NZTailender]

Yorkshire Cricket Club Awards Night

Now it's time for the club's "all time" awards and best XIs. Let's kick off with the best One Day bowler. This one really is a no brainer, with the winner having almost double the amount of wickets of his nearest friendly rival. Saqlain Mushtaq was superb in this arena, and despite a fairly rocky season 3, he ended up taking 64 wickets @ 26.86 over 3 seasons, with six 5 wicket hauls and a best of 6-18.

Like the bowling category, the OD Batsman award was an easy pick. Chris Taylor was the man who had a team built around him. Rock solid at number 3 in the order, he chalked up 1822 runs @ 62.83, with 4 centuries, 16 fifties and a high of 139.

On to the First Class awards, first up we'll have the batting award. This was a tougher one to decide, with nom out and out star, with a number of people having 1 good season and 2 rather quiet ones. J Bradshaw, J Patel, J Rudolph, L Kumar, M Atapattu, M Vaughan and R Beetson all cracked the 1000 run barrier, notching up a handful of centuries each. Patel had a stormer of season 3, while Kumar unexpectedly juggled the roles of keeper and batsman superbly. Rudolph, Bradshaw, Sayers, Vaughan and Hick were all frustrating with moments of brilliance, but there was a man there from day one, being a mainstay in the middle order. He nearly cracked 2000 runs, and scored the clubs first double tonne. W Tendulkar is Yorkshires best batsman, and we salute him for all his hard work in this competition and the previous incarnations.

The First Class bowling award...well...does it even need to be announced? No one bowler took wickets as consistently as Saqlain Mushtaq. Perhaps if retirement didn't push Hoggard out of the picture, or if the competition continued and van Wyk continued his fantastic bowling, we would see a gap that is not nearly as big as this.143 wickets, 1 ten-wicket haul, 7 five-wicket hauls, a best of 7-32 and an average of 28.24 is the record of a true great. And as a testament to that, it's no wonder that he picks up the award for Yorkshire's Overall Best Player
A special mention goes out to L Kumar who was one of the best keeper-batsmen in the competition, and to J's Rudolph and Bradshaw, who kept the scorecard ticking over in both arenas.

And now, the Yorkshire All Time First Elevens

Yorkshire OD XI
1. M Atapattu
2. L Kumar+
3. C Taylor
4. J Rudolph
5. J Bradshaw
6. R Beetson
7. EP van Wyk
8. B Virdi
9. S Mushtaq
10. T Gruggen
11. M Hoggard

Yorkshire FC XI
1. M Atapattu
2. R Beetson
3. J Patel
4. M Vaughan
5. W Tendulkar
6. J Rudolph
7. L Kumar+
8. R McLaren
9. EP van Wyk
10. L Smythe
11. S Mushtaq