Ben Stokes - The Best Cricketer of the Week

Slaying your enemy has been a feature of society since the dawn of civilisation. Ovid stated that "conquering ...neighbours was your chief occupation." It's easy to transfer that to the tribalism of sport where your myopic occupation is to put your rivals to the sword. The rarest form of success in ancient battle was where one leader would kill the leader of the opposition in hand to hand combat. The first early Roman king to do this was the very earliest Roman king; Romulus. On a whim, Romulus stripped the blood-soaked armour from his foe and took it back to Rome. This became known as the 'Spoils of Honour.' This was a feat only ever achieved rarely. In our particular field of battle, two leaders of men faced off this week with the eyes of the world on them. The fiery red haired leader of the Celts faced up (quite literally) to his giant rival - but it was the latter who was David to Stokes' Goliath. But to whom went the spoils? Well funnily enough - not the victor. This was a personal battle between the two men. It was Holder who first claimed the spoils of war, but, unlike in the field of battle, Stokes had the opportunity of nabbing them back. Inevitably, Holder had his man in the second innings too. Much like the Spoils of Honour, two captains dismissing each other is a rare achievement. This was only the twelfth time two captains have dismissed each other - and only the third time it has happened in the first innings. This duelling aside, the Test had a deja vu feel to it for the England fan. Last February, Stokes was the stand out performer for England in their underwhelming tour of the Caribbean. In this reverse fixture it seem's not a lot has changed. Despite the criticism of his captaincy and selection decisions, his performance was unaffected. He became the second captain in Test history, after Monty Noble and Lala Amarnath, to be the top run scorer and best bowler in the first innings. This has seen the Durham man claim his sixth Cricketer of the Week accolade. He becomes the seventh player to win the Cricketer of the Week award twice in a row - but there wasn't much competition for him to beat off for that title. That being said, nobody has ever done three weeks in a row. If Stokes can keep up this form he could break that record and extend his 378 point lead at the top of the overall table. The first battle has been lost - but will Stokes end with dominion in the war.

The pandemic is going to change our results come the end of the year. One player who could cash in is Jason Holder. In one Test match, the West Indian captain climbed four places on the overall table with his score of 259. This sees him now in 13th place - 13 points behind Virat Kohli. Lucky for some. Holder is the player on our list that has the most guaranteed cricket in his calendar. With two more Test here, he will then go on to captain the Barbados side in the CPL. Holder's 13th place is even more remarkable when you take into consideration that he has only been active for six weeks out of a possible fifteenth. So where could Holder end up this year? To consider that we need to look at those around him as well as what he could achieve. In the two weeks where he has played red ball cricket this year, he has scored 200+ each time. If we then pencil him in for another 400 points before the end of the Test series it would place him second with 1219. And that is we even consider the CPL starting in August. We also need to consider those around him. Are any of those players likely to rise with him? This week he overtook Tom Banton, Glenn Maxwell, Mohammad Nabi and Shubman Gill. Out of that group, only Banton and Nabi have any cricket on their schedule: Banton with England and Nabi alongside Holder with Barbados. Looking above Holder, the only players with confirmed cricket are Lewis Gregory, Babar Azam and, of course, the Test duo of Stokes and Joe Root. In these circumstances, we may need to be considering Holder as a top five player on our overall list very soon. This could be doing the Barbadian a disservice. We have seen over the weekend that, on his day, he may have been good enough to earn that in a regular year. However you play the hand you are dealt - and Holder might just have the most Royal of flushes.

Week

Ben Stokes - 309
Jason Holder - 259

Kyle Abbott - dnp
Colin Ackermann - dnp
Babar Azam - dnp
Tom Banton - dnp
Aaron Finch - dnp
Shubman Gill - dnp
Martin Guptill- dnp
Peter Handscomb - dnp
Simon Harmer - dnp
Virat Kohli- dnp
Marnus Labuschagne- dnp
Keshav Maharaj- dnp
Glenn Maxwell - dnp
Mohammad Nabi- dnp
Joe Root- dnp
Rohit Sharma- dnp
Steve Smith - dnp
David Warner - dnp

Overall

Ben Stokes - 1621
Martin Guptill - 1243
Keshav Maharaj - 1176
Joe Root - 1109
Steve Smith - 1109
Marnus Labuschagne - 1000
Aaron Finch - 980
Travis Head - 901
Babar Azam - 874
David Warner - 821
Lewis Gregory - 819
Virat Kohli - 787
Jason Holder- 774
Shubman Gill - 752
Mohammad Nabi - 701
Glenn Maxwell - 650
Tom Banton - 603
Rohit Sharma - 471
Peter Handscomb - 383