The year has been bookended by outstanding performances from Bangladesh captain Shakib Al Hasan but, in the words of Vanessa Williams, he went and saved the best for last. At the end of the month of January, Shakib had won Cricketer of the Week twice and was second in the overall placings. Since then injury and sporadic activity saw him only finish atop the overall league once more in August, however his performances in the T20 series against West Indies have been nothing short of phenomenal. The allrounder has proved himself just that with 103 runs and 8 wickets - including a T20 five-fer. He also marked the Week by becoming the third highest wicket taker in T20Is with 86. It speaks of the gulf between players just outside the top ten that, despite his haul of 403 points this week, he doesn't move a single place in the overall table. He is now 41 points off Ravi Ashwin in 12th place. With next week being a round up of the year and a breakdown of the top ten, it seems apposite to look at our mid table. This little patch of our overall table sees Ravis Ashwin and Jadeja as well as Shakib very much adrift of the top eleven but also fields ahead of Quinton De Kock in 15th. These three players are all in this cricketing limbo for a number of reasons. As has been very clear in these posts, Ravi Jadeja's season has oscillated between god awful and phenomenal, so I guess it seems fitting he languishes bang in the middle of the table. Ashwin is in the autumn of his cricketing years and is seemingly being protected in the mould of Jimmy Anderson so he has not played as many games as he once did. And then, to round it off, Shakib who has been injury plagued. All three of these players are capable of turning in great performances but not with the regularity to push on into the top ten.
You work hard for your team all season. You, almost single-handedly get them to the final. You know the fate of the team rests on your shoulders. So what do you do? You crap out for five and hand victory to the opposing team. Such was the fate of Quinton De Kock who ended his most consistently profligate period of time in 2018 with his lowest score of the year. Anti-climactic disappointments aside, De Kock has used the Mzansi Super League to boost his points hugely. The South African wicket-keeper-batsman added exactly 800 points to his overall tally during the tournament and now sees himself the leading active South African international on our overall list. Our South African contingent have disappointed this year; clustered, as they are, in the lower mid-section of the table and far far adrift of the top half. The fact that a player that was widely ignored throughout the year's marquee domestic T20 competition has managed to overhaul his more wellthought of colleagues is testament to the damp squib of a year for the Saffers.
I have focused on the middle of the table and just outside the top ten. Before I move on to the only surviving battle within the top ten I suppose a cursory glance at the bottom of the table is needed. Languishing in last place is George Bailey. His sporadic scores of 50+ throughout the latter stages of the year have not managed to see him 'pull a Jadeja' and spurt up the table. He is still 62 points off Steve Smith in 23rd. In a death grip of futility Smith and Warner have stayed glued to one another since the fateful day in South Africa and sit in 22nd and 23rd. Whatever emerges about their future in 2019 should be fascinating, although they are very unlikely to be retained on our watch list. I mean, even the BPL considered Smith damaged property enough for Comilla to drop him. Then in 21st (notional bottom place) sits Hashim Amla. This week has been a better one for him as he coupled his now obligatory duck with 61 in his second innings for Cape Cobras against the Warriors. It has been an underwhelming year for the bearded one but we have walked this path before in previous posts.
From about March, Kane Williamson has made tenth place his base camp from which he has not wandered too far from before scurrying back from either direction. This week he scored 121 thanks to a decent batting performance against Pakistan but this was not enough to stop the onwards charge of Nathan Lyon to knock him down into eleventh place in the eleventh hour. Williamson has been by far the most consistent player of the two throughout the year. As was mentioned last week, Lyon has spent long periods of time inactive; this has meant that between January and September, Williamson had the most points per month in all but two. This has all changed since October though, when Lyon has gone into hyperdrive. With monthly scores of 894 in October, 599 in November and 1054 so far in December, Lyon's unstoppable surge has seen him on an upward trajectory from 15th place in the first week of October to tenth today. With a week left in the year both players have Test matches on their schedule. Will Lyon's 191 point cushion be enough to lock Williamson out?
Week
Shakib Al Hasan - 403
Nathan Lyon - 344
Jeetan Patel - 212
Simon Harmer - 197
Virat Kohli- 190
Dean Elgar - 122
Kane Williamson- 121
Rashid Khan - 110
Aaron Finch - 105
Hashim Amla - 81
George Bailey - 62
Jofra Archer - 50
Jos Buttler - 50
Shaun Marsh - 50
Joe Root- 18
Quinton De Kock- 5
Mitchell Marsh - 3
Ravi Ashwin- dnp
AB De Villiers- dnp
JP Duminy- dnp
Ravi Jadeja- dnp
Sunil Narine- dnp
Steve Smith - dnp
David Warner - dnp
Overall
Simon Harmer - 8426
Rashid Khan - 6135
Jeetan Patel - 5819
Virat Kohli- 4855
Jos Buttler - 4584
Jofra Archer - 4433
Sunil Narine- 4377
Joe Root - 4198
Aaron Finch - 4149
Nathan Lyon - 4380
Kane Williamson - 4181
Ravi Ashwin - 3845
Shakib Al Hasan - 3804
Ravi Jadeja - 3303
Quinton de Kock - 3081
Mitchell Marsh - 2909
Dean Elgar- 2736
Shaun Marsh- 2599
AB De Villiers- 2542
JP Duminy - 2496
Hashim Amla - 2283
David Warner - 1401
Steve Smith - 1350
George Bailey - 1298
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