Jeetan Patel - The Best Cricketer of the Week

Why spin bowlers do so well in these rankings proves elusive to me. Jeetan Patel is the third spin bowler after Nathan Lyon and Simon Harmer to sit atop the table for cricketer of the week. Perhaps the reason is that they keep such low economies coupled alongside, occasionally, devastating wicket taking abilities. This was certainly the case for the veteran New Zealand international in his game for Wellington this week. The very well rested player has not played a game since the 14th January and has long sat rock bottom of our overall table. This was drastically put right with a ten wicket match and a stunning 21 maidens - the highest I can remember for any player in 2018. With the County Championship just around the corner, Patel will hope to continue to put his mark on the overall table for Warwickshire. It is now Ravi Jadeja who holds the unenviable position of lowest scoring player. 

Another long absent player that had a smashing week on return was Shakib Al Hasan - however this smashing was more literal than he would have liked. After six weeks out of the game, the former table topping allrounder got 27 points but then proceeded to be involved in a high profile spell of defiance which saw the glass in the Bangladesh dressing room getting smashed. The Jessore born man has a plethora of domestic T20 games round the corner but is a mile away from the top ten due to his lengthily injury - despite this we know he is capable of inflicting big hitting deliveries on more than just glazing so we could see him edge up the table. 

It was a confusing week for two Test playing regulars. For Joe Root, this was down to the fact that he was playing practice matches against a New Zealand XI, however it is amusing to see him pick up almost as many points for his bowling as for his batting. The part time spinner looked slightly more than part time against the rather green batsmen of New Zealand's second tier. This, plus his 166 runs across two games, has seen him push into the top five of the overall table with a comfortable cushion ahead of 6th place Mitchell Marsh. The next player in his sights is Sunil Narine, who is expected to have a spell out of the game once the PSL finishes this week. If Root keeps up this pressure he will move even further up the table. 

Any casual observer of Test cricket will say that strike rate is not where the players are likely to pick up too many of their points. AB De Villiers has been the exception to this in the Second Test. In a Test series that has seen no player pull away from the pack in a dramatic fashion, De Villiers was prolific with both runs scored (154) and strike rates (86.30 and 107.69). This has seen him pick up 214 - his highest score for a week by some margin - and place him as the highest South African international on the overall league. He is in massive form since his international comeback with five 50s in 10 innings and rightly deserves to be ascending the table. 

No doubt the South Africa- Australia Test series is proving entertaining - but it is also throwing up some unlikely high scorers. From just this week's table we see the aforementioned AB De Villiers at the top of the table, alongside Nathan Lyon and the unassuming Mitchell Marsh. Down at the other end of the table we see (perhaps expectedly) Shaun Marsh but then followed by Steve Smith and Dean Elgar. This has very much been a Test series geared up for the allrounder rather than the prolific runscorer. In fact the word prolific is not an adjective you would associate with either Steve Smith or Dean Elgar in 2018 - who have both looked unassuming compared to their heroics of 2017. This is reflected in their positions in the bottom third of the overall table. 

Week

Jeetan Patel - 436
Joe Root - 361
Rashid Khan - 234
AB De Villiers- 214
Nathan Lyon - 167
JP Duminy - 134
Mitchell Marsh - 124
Sunil Narine - 116
Hashim Amla - 103
David Warner - 96
Quinton de Kock- 89
Dean Elgar - 82 
Ravi Ashwin - 68
Steve Smith- 56
George Bailey - 46
Shakib Al Hasan - 27
Aaron Finch - 25
Shaun Marsh - 25
Jofra Archer - dnp 
Jos Buttler - dnp 
Simon Harmer - dnp 
Ravi Jadeja - dnp 
Virat Kohli - dnp 
Kane Williamson - dnp 

Overall

Rashid Khan - 1758
JP Duminy - 1659
Simon Harmer - 1593
Sunil Narine- 1450
Joe Root - 1308
Mitchell Marsh - 1245
Virat Kohli- 1231
Nathan Lyon - 1225
Jos Buttler - 1026
Aaron Finch - 999
Kane Williamson -906
Ravi Ashwin - 878
AB De Villiers- 778
Quinton de Kock - 670
David Warner - 650
Steve Smith - 633
Shakib Al Hasan - 635
Hashim Amla - 598
George Bailey - 560
Dean Elgar- 557
Jofra Archer - 550
Jeetan Patel - 544
Shaun Marsh- 506
Ravi Jadeja - 412