Rashid Khan - The Best Cricketer of the Week

It was a quiet week for the majority of the players on our list. With the exception of six players, our Cricketers were gearing up for the start of the IPL season or the County Championship warm up games. The notable exception to this was Rashid Khan. He is featuring in his inaugural IPL 2019 game for Hyderabad as I type, but rather than relaxing or conditioning he had the small matter of being an instrumental part of guiding Afghanistan to their historic first Test victory. In so doing he tops our weekly league for the first time in 2019. It has been a long wait for the Afghanistan spinner. The last time he topped our overall table was last August after a spell of strong bowling for Sussex in the T20 Blast - now he is riding high for his less favoured style of cricket. He also has found himself shooting up the table in the overall league. Last week I spoke about how Ben Stokes was likely to overtake Shakib Al Hasan for the second spot overall - instead Rashid has leapt 5 places into second. Throughout 2018, Rashid being in the top 3 was something of a regular feature and with the IPL season in front of him I don't see him getting much lower than that over the coming weeks. 

Every IPL throws up some interesting battles. Last year's tournament saw the trio of AB De Villiers, Virat Kohli and Kane Williamson in positions 7, 8 and 9. The next six weeks saw some intense jostling between these three world class batsmen to see who would come out on top. Fast forward to this year's tournament and it seems like deja vu. In seventh place at this moment in time sits Bangalore's Virat Kohli and just one point behind him sits Hyderabad's Kane Williamson. With AB De Villiers not reselected for our list this year we need a replacement for our three way tussle. Enter Rohit Sharma. He is currently in ninth place, 111 points behind Williamson, but Mumbai's captain could very well use his fierce short form ability to give his two rivals a run for their money. It really is an interesting quandary as to who will be the best this year. With Kane Williamson not starting for Hyderabad in their season opener and Bangalore being humiliated yesterday, I would not put it passed Rohit to eat into that 111 point deficit and leave his two compatriots for dust. 

It is easy to forgot our lower placed contributors in our list. We learnt this last year when Ravi Jadeja went from rock bottom of the table to pushing the top ten in a handful of weeks. With this in mind, we need to linger over Abdur Razzak. After week eight the Bangladeshi had gone pointless and was the second to last player to register a point in the competition. From there, Razzak has been quietly grinding away for his domestic team, Prime Bank, and has only failed to get a wicket in one of the eight games he has played in. This week he overtakes Shubman Gill in the overall table to pull out of the bottom three and is only a handful of points away from the likes of Mohammad Abbas and Shai Hope. This could all change over the coming weeks. The bottom three now consists of Shubman Gill, Wayne Parnell and Jack Leach. Gill is very likely to make an impact for Kolkata in the IPL and Parnell and Leach will be featuring for their counties in the University warm up games this very week. Furthermore, we must also remember that Morne Morkel has yet to register a point but is turning out for the reigning champions Surrey against the MCC at this very moment. The bottom of this table will be in a huge state of flux over the next few weeks and is just as exciting as the top of the table tussle. 

Week

Rashid Khan - 240
Abdur Razzak - 120
Joe Burns - 64
Mohammad Abbas - 40
Glenn Maxwell - 30
Virat Kohli - 6

Shakib Al Hasan - dnp 
Jonny Bairstow- dnp 
Jos Buttler - dnp 
Shubman Gill - dnp 
Simon Harmer - dnp 
Shai Hope - dnp 
Shreyas Iyer - dnp 
Jack Leach- dnp 
Duanne Olivier - dnp 
Jeetan Patel - dnp 
Joe Root - dnp 
Callum Ferguson - dnp 
Wayne Parnell - dnp 
Rohit Sharma - dnp 
Ben Stokes - dnp 
Kane Williamson - dnp 
Kuldeep Yadav - dnp 

Morne Morkel- ytp 

Overall 

Glenn Maxwell - 1435
Rashid Khan - 1314
Shakib Al Hasan - 1171
Ben Stokes - 1160
Shreyas Iyer - 1124
Joe Root- 1102
Virat Kohli- 1076
Kane Williamson - 1075
Rohit Sharma - 964
Kuldeep Yadav - 870
Jonny Bairstow - 836
Duanne Olivier - 793
Jos Buttler - 760
Joe Burns - 699
Callum Ferguson - 671
Jeetan Patel - 625
Simon Harmer - 500
Shai Hope - 465
Mohammad Abbas - 461
Abdur Razzak- 378
Shubman Gill - 340
Wayne Parnell - 148
Jack Leach - 65

Morne Morkel - ytp 

Rohit Sharma - The Best Cricketer of the Week

In the next two months we have the cricketing spectacles of the IPL and the World Cup, two tournaments that are going to show off Indian talent at it's very best. This is a frightening prospect for the non-Indian players in our list due to the domination already shown by the men in blue this year. Of the 11 weeks of 2019 so far, four have been topped by four different Indian players. This week it is Rohit Sharma who has taken top billing, receiving the baton from Virat Kohli who won last time out. This dominance of Indian players also continues with Shreyas Iyer finishing third this week and pushing his way into 4th overall. This from a player who doesn't even make international team selection To think that this array of success comes from a precursor to the main event is rather frightening. Despite the fact that England have long been favourites to lift the World Cup this summer, I am starting to think that the wealth of Indian talent will give them more of a run for their money. With Sharma having scored 286 runs in his IPL season last year I see no reason why his success is going to be limited over the coming month. He has recently been pushed out of the top five but is well placed to ease back in as he is only 138 runs behind Joe Root in fifth. 

One sure sign of success in our overall list is a player who picks up points Week in week out, regardless of the form they may be in. Glenn Maxwell extended his lead at the top of the overall table to 234 despite the fact that his two contributions with the bat this week totalled a mere 24 runs across two innings. He managed to bolster his score with 20 points from the field, an economy of 5.66 in the last ODI and a typically Maxwellian strike rate of 176.92 from his 23 off 13 balls in the 4th ODI. Maxwell is quickly becoming a key player for the Australian set up and is making his spot in the team assured - even with the question marks around the potential return of the disgraced duo. His performances with both bat and ball as well as his spectacular displays in the field add an extra dimension to his game that others struggle to match. Maxwell opted to not join an IPL franchise and will spend some time with Victoria as they see out their Sheffield Shield season. Will his red ball form see him fight off the challenge of Ben Stokes? The English allrounder will be representing Rajasthan in the IPL and is just 245 runs behind the Aussie. Will regular short form games get the better of weekly longer form ones? 

The cricketing world was full of admiration for Joe Burns after his 180 for Australia against Sri Lanka at the start of February. His was a story of sporting redemption akin to Rocky. Despite being discarded by the Australian national set up with the callousness of a young Apollo Creed, the Queenslander used his sparkling form in the Sheffield Shield and the relative weakness of the Sri Lankan side to claim redemption. Yo, Adrian, he did it! The sporting playbook would now like to see him go from strength to strength to face the might of the English side and go toe-to-toe with Australia's historic rivals in top form. This is not playing out as he would like though. Since that table topping Week, Burns has struggled to replicate his form from before the BBL. After 140 runs for Queensland against Victoria, he followed it up with 28 and a duck against New South Wales and then 11 and a duck this week against South Australia. This is even more worrying due to the fact it was his Sheffield Shield strength that convinced the Australia selectors to include him in their Test thinking. He still has time to redress these issues and will spend time in England acclimatising with Lancashire but by the time he faces up to the Clubber Lang of world cricket on the first of August he will hope to be off the ropes. 

Week

Rohit Sharma - 211
Jeetan Patel - 179 
Shreyas Iyer - 141
Kane Williamson - 104
Rashid Khan - 95
Mohammad Abbas - 90
Glenn Maxwell - 84
Abdur Razzak - 80
Jonny Bairstow- 77
Virat Kohli- 67
Kuldeep Yadav - 59
Joe Burns- 31
Joe Root - 4
Shai Hope - 0

Shakib Al Hasan - dnp 
Joe Buttler - dnp 
Callum Ferguson - dnp 
Shubman Gill- dnp 
Simon Harmer - dnp 
Jack Leach - dnp 
Duanne Olivier - dnp 
Wayne Parnell - dnp 
Ben Stokes- dnp 

Morne Morkel- ytp 

Overall 

Glenn Maxwell - 1405
Shakib Al Hasan - 1171
Ben Stokes - 1160
Shreyas Iyer - 1124
Joe Root- 1102
Kane Williamson - 1075
Rashid Khan - 1074
Virat Kohli- 1070
Rohit Sharma - 964
Kuldeep Yadav - 870
Jonny Bairstow - 836
Duanne Olivier - 793
Jos Buttler - 760
Callum Ferguson - 671
Joe Burns - 635
Jeetan Patel - 625
Simon Harmer - 500
Shai Hope - 465
Mohammad Abbas - 421
Shubman Gill - 340
Abdur Razzak- 258
Wayne Parnell - 148
Jack Leach - 65

Morne Morkel - ytp 

Virat Kohli - The Best Cricketer of the Week

Our list shows no bias. Batsmen are dealt with in the same way as bowlers. The Test favourite is on an equal playing field to the T20 mercenary. One thing that you can be sure of is that if you score two centuries in a week, you are going to be claiming top spot. Virat Kohli, this week's winner, has not claimed the title as many times as you would have thought. This is only his fifth time at the pinnacle of our list. Out of his previous four table-topping performances three have been whilst representing Bangalore. The other? Well, that was for a week where he scored two hundreds in two ODIs against West Indies. To pull off that feat once is a great achievement - to do so twice shows the man is a true ODI legend. As well as taking his inaugural Cricketer of the Week accolade for 2019, he also climbs into the overall top five for the first time this year - quite an achievement when you consider he has been inactive for 40% of gameweeks. He finds himself cheek by jowel with his old enemy from 2018. Joe Root is just in front of him in fourth place. The two captains spent all of 2018 in a dog fight - and with just 95 points between them we look set for a similar battle this time out. 

It was just a matter of time as to when Shakib Al Hasan would lose his overall top spot - and it has taken rather longer than many would have thought. Three weeks ago it seemed like Ben Stokes was going to overtake the Bangladesh captain but a subsequent dip in form and a break from the game left the field open for Glenn Maxwell. Last week he trailed Shakib by a solitary point but now has a lead of 150. Strangely enough a wicket was the way that Maxwell initially eased into top spot however he then followed that up with 51 runs for Australia in two ODIs against India. Again we have seen an extension of the rule I set out last week: If Maxwell scores big Australia win. Whilst the performances of Usman Khawaja and Aaron Finch would have caught the eye more, 47 off 31 balls for Maxwell continued to push the envelope for the Aussies in Friday's game. The stellar run of form that has seen Maxwell move up our overall table has also seen him move up the batting order for his national team. Starting this series at 7, he came in at first drop for yesterday's ODI. Perhaps an acknowledgment of his big hitting prowess. 

This week has seen two of our favourites hope to turn over a new leaf in 2019 by displaying something a little different to what we have seen from them thus far. Last year Rashid Khan's party trick was getting wickets in clusters and backing that up with explosive batting. So far we have seen him struggle to combine these facets of his game. Sometimes getting one, rarely getting two, oftentimes getting none. Even this week, where he got his highest score of the year and claimed second place on our weekly table, he picked up 50 economy points but just three wickets against the comparatively fragile batsmen of Ireland. Even his approach to batting seems markedly different. For someone whose ODI batting average is 99.86, to see Rashid grinding out 52 off 58 balls batting at number nine is odd to say the least. I have often speculated that Rashid is trying to adapt himself into something of an allrounder- perhaps he used this game to practice a new approach to his batting. Another player that showed us something different was Jeetan Patel. Last year's third place finisher has began the year out of sorts. Last week he was in the bottom five of all contributors and only finds himself one better this week despite getting 149 - by far his biggest total of the year. This is largely thanks to a stunning cameo of 20 off 11 balls with the bat - something almost unheard of from the Kiwi. Patel is usually a player associated with combining large hauls of wickets with economies regularly under 4. So far this year he is struggling with both. Against Canterbury he broke one of these hoodoos and managed to sort out his economy but we still await the Patel who can gut a batting order. Both Patel and Khan were in the mix all the way through 2018, if they keep up the form they have shown this week they could be working up the league in no time. 

Week 

Virat Kohli- 319
Rashid Khan - 210
Kuldeep Yadav- 183
Jonny Bairstow - 160
Glenn Maxwell - 151
Jeetan Patel - 149
Shreyas Iyer - 118
Joe Root - 105
Mohammad Abbas - 70
Callum Ferguson - 68
Abdur Razzak - 51
Joe Burns - 48
Shai Hope - 43
Rohit Sharma - 14


Shakib Al Hasan - dnp 
Jos Buttler - dnp 
Shubman Gill - dnp 
Simon Harmer - dnp 
Jack Leach- dnp 
Duanne Olivier - dnp 
Wayne Parnell - dnp 
Ben Stokes - dnp 
Kane Williamson - dnp 

Morne Morkel- ytp 

Overall 

Glenn Maxwell - 1321
Shakib Al Hasan - 1171
Ben Stokes - 1160
Joe Root- 1098
Virat Kohli- 1003
Shreyas Iyer - 983
Rashid Khan - 979
Kane Williamson - 971
Kuldeep Yadav - 811
Duanne Olivier - 793
Jos Buttler - 760
Jonny Bairstow - 759
Rohit Sharma - 753
Callum Ferguson - 671
Joe Burns - 604
Simon Harmer - 500
Shai Hope - 465
Jeetan Patel - 446
Shubman Gill - 340
Mohammad Abbas - 331
Abdur Razzak- 178
Wayne Parnell - 148
Jack Leach - 65

Morne Morkel - ytp 

Glenn Maxwell - The Best Cricketer of the Week

Jos Buttler striking balls for fun. Kane Williamson grinding out a double hundred. This week has been a high scoring one for the boys on our list. This being said, neither of these high profile contributors have prevailed for Cricketer of the Week. Instead, that accolade has gone to Glenn Maxwell whose three innings against India have racked up 209 runs - including his third T20i ton. This is more runs than Buttler scored across his two games against a (supposably) weaker West Indies side and less than Williamson scored against a (definitely) weaker Bangladesh side. Instead we laud a player from an Australian side, for whom the adjective beleaguered is becoming a trademark, facing off against one of the World Cup favourites. In other weeks, Buttler or Williamson would have topped the charts but they have to take a back seat for Australia's secret weapon. What is becoming very clear is that when Maxwell plays destructively, Australia win. In the two games this week where he picked up points for his strike rates the Aussies won, but in yesterday's game where his 40 off 55 saw him just short of strike rate points, Australia were left wanting. Maxwell is now just a mere two points from the overall top spot and is likely to be Australia's secret weapon as the World Cup looms. 

You may have felt that these posts have been rather lacking in praise for a certain aggressive Indian captain thus far in 2019. Mediocre performances and a long spell of rest for Virat Kohli have seen him not really feature in our calculations up to this point. However, his return to action this week has seen him return to form and score 240 points. This allows him to finish in our weekly top 5 for the first time in 2019. His 240 points constitute something of a total performance from the Indian - something we were very used to last year. 60% of his points came from the but a full quarter of his points came through fielding and strike rate. His tally this week also sees his average points for active weeks go up hugely. Before this week his average points were 111 across the four weeks in which he has played, it is now at 136.8. It also wouldn't be a decent Kohli week without a stat dredged out by ardent Indian fans to celebrate their superstar - however this one is a little special. With 304 days left in the year, Kohli has already surpassed Ricky Ponting's 18,962 runs scored in a calendar decade. Yes, Kohli will have played more games but....god that's a cool stat. Despite this strong week, Kohli is still outside our overall top ten - but on this form, for how long?

Kohli is not the only Indian batsman to surge up the table this week. Many see Shubman Gill as the future of Indian cricket - but his performances so far this year have not really demonstrated that. He started 2019 with a score of 91 for Punjab against Bengal but then he scored a cumulative 37 runs across 5 innings. Potentially more damagingly, 16 of these came in two games where he was called up to the full ODI side - aside he has now been discarded from for the Australian tour. It is therefore pleasing to see the young man score 102 runs across three games for Punjab this week - however he has very much ridden on the back of a 70* against tournament whipping boys Sikkim. Despite the fact he doubled his total for the year this week, he finds himself 6th from bottom of our overall league and our lowest place Indian player. Things look a little more troubling when you investigate those players below him. Gill has featured in 8 games for his 340 points. Jeetan Patel, one place below him, has played 7. Whilst the bottom 4 of Abbas, Parnell, Leach and Razzak have played 3, 4, 1 and 1 respectively. Of players to have had a decent run of games in 2019 - only Jeetan Patel has scored less than this Indian prodigy. I am in no way saying this 19-year-old doesn't have a chance but in order to cement your authority you need to seize your chances. Something that Gill has failed to display so far this year. 

Week

Glenn Maxwell - 339
Jos Buttler - 273
Kane Williamson - 260 
Virat Kohli- 240
Joe Burns - 190
Rashid Khan - 187
Shubman Gill - 172
Jonny Bairstow - 107
Shreyas Iyer- 94
Callum Ferguson - 91
Shai Hope - 68 
Kuldeep Yadav - 60
Ben Stokes - 56
Abdur Razzak- 47
Rohit Sharma - 42
Joe Root - 16
Wayne Parnell - 15
Mohammad Abbas - 1 

Shakib Al Hasan - dnp 
Simon Harmer - dnp 
Jack Leach- dnp 
Duanne Olivier - dnp 
Jeetan Patel - dnp 

Morne Morkel - ytp 

Overall 

Shakib Al Hasan - 1171
Glenn Maxwell - 1170
Ben Stokes - 1160
Kane Williamson - 971
Joe Root- 993
Shreyas Iyer - 865
Duanne Olivier - 793
Rashid Khan - 769
Rohit Sharma - 739
Jos Buttler - 760
Virat Kohli- 684
Kuldeep Yadav - 628
Callum Ferguson - 603
Jonny Bairstow - 599
Joe Burns - 556
Simon Harmer - 500
Shai Hope - 422
Shubman Gill - 340
Jeetan Patel - 297
Mohammad Abbas - 261
Wayne Parnell - 148
Jack Leach - 65
Abdur Razzak- 47

Morne Morkel - ytp