Vaibhav Sooryavanshi - The Best Cricketer of the Week

 

Well here we are again....and what a doozy of a week with over 2000 points scored. Let's see who leads us out.

Scores after Week 1

1. Vaibhav Sooryavanshi - 386 - Sooryavanshi, like Athapaththu before him, is a very experimental pick. Something of an unknown quantity and a very left field pick. And just like Athapaththu, he dispels those concerns by finishing first in Week 1. Very impressive debut.

2. Ravindra Jadeja - 288 - A couple of games for Saurashtra in the Vijay Hazare Trophy this week and he underlined his all rounder capabilities by scoring in 7 of the 8 point scoring categories.....just Fielding Bonus points for him left.

3. Travis Head- 262 - Had a stinker of a year last year and never reached nay higher than ninth. He is now born again as an opener and has come straight in at Number 3 for the New Year. Can he return to his 2024 peak where he finished third?

4. Harry Brook - 176 - Will want to put 2025 well behind him. He finished 10th but was a year replete with poor decision; both on and off the field. 126 runs in the final Test is enough for him to start the year on the front foot.

5. Jos Buttler - 163 - Refreshingly...and I suspect rarely....the highest T20 point score of the year only manages to sneak into the Top 5. 113 runs for Durban in the SA20 (albeit very unevenly split) also gives Buttler the best T20 average with him scoring 81 and a half points per game (a new metric for 2026)


Highest Weekly Average

Not applicable this week

Highest Average Points per Game

Red Ball- n/a
One Day - Ravindra Jadeja - 144
Short Form - Jos Buttler - 81.5

Highest Points by Format

Red Ball- Travis Head - 262
One Day - Vaibhav Sooryavanshi - 386
Short Form - Jos Buttler - 163

Highest Points by Discipline

Runs - Vaibhav Sooryavanshi - 206
Batting Bonus - Vaibhav Sooryavanshi- 50
Strike rate - Vaibhav Sooryavanshi - 70

Wickets - Ravindra Jadeja - 80
Wicket Bonus - Ravindra Jadeja - 20
Economy Saim Ayub - 30

Fielding - Vaibhav Sooryavanshi - 40
Fielding Bonus - n/a

List In Full

1 Vaibhav Sooryavanshi 386
2 Ravindra Jadeja 288
3 Travis Head 262
4 Harry Brook 176
5 Jos Buttler 163
6 Sam Curran 161
7 Quinton de Kock 149
8 Saib Ayub 144
9 Nicholas Pooran 112
10 Mehidy Hasan Miraz 109
11 Rachin Ravindra 97
12 Aiden Markram 93
13 Phil Salt 63
14 Simon Harmer 46
15 Pathum Nissanka 22
16 Shubman Gill 11
17 Marco Jansen 0
18 Liam Dawson ytp
19 Nat Sciver-Brunt ytp
20 Sophie Ecclestone ytp
21 Michael Bracewell ytp
22 Paul Walter ytp

The Cricket List 2026 Reveal

And with 2025 done and dusted....let's start revealing the names of the 2026 participants of The Cricket List starting with the retained players.

Retained 

Saim Ayub - Had his year disrupted by that severe injury on January 1st last year. Managed to drag himself up to 13th but fully fit and firing on all cylinders he could be in for a big year in 2026.

Harry Brook - Back for his fourth consecutive year on The Cricket List despite having a less than impressive 2025. For the man who is the poster boy for the future of English cricket 2026 will be a big year.

Jos Buttler - The Cricketer of the Year from 2024 back for his 6th year overall. Is he able to finish in the Top 5 for the third year in the row?

Sam Curran - Our Cricketer of the Year for 2025 was a gimme to return in 2026. Can he be the first Cricketer to do it back to back since Simon Harmer?

Liam Dawson - A bit of a surprise package in 2025.....mainly because he played so much cricket that I wouldn't have been overly surprised if he was playing in my garden one given evening.

Travis Head - Not the best of year's for Head who finished 17th in 2025 - a far cry from his third place finish in 2024. Which version of him will be served up in 2026?

Ravindra Jadeja - Won't play as much as some of the others on our List but when he does he will score big. Can he finish in the Top 5 in successive years?

Pathum Nissanka - Got knocked out of the Top Ten on the very last day of the year but is a huge huge talent that may only get huger as he has managed to pick himself an IPL deal for 2026.

Nicholas Pooran - Finished just outside the Top 5 this year and plays in every T20 franchise going. Can he breach the Top 5 this year?

Phil Salt - Back for his third consecutive year in The Cricket List. Finished in the Top Ten both years but without ever really threatening anything bigger. Maybe this year?

Nat Sciver-Brunt - A good year domestically for NSB where she was instrumental in both the WIPL and WBBL....less impressive internationally but some development to come.

Returning 

Quinton De Kock - Last seen in these parts in 2022 where he finished 8th. T20 gun for hire and now back in the Proteas green too so should be scoring big.

Shubman Gill - Finished 2024 in 16th place....you feel if he was selected this year he would have finished rather higher than that.

Simon Harmer - The All Time highest Cricketer of the Week winner returns. Not only is he a County Championship stalwart but now a genuine Test spinning threat.

Marco Jansen - Was on our List in 2023 but lacked consistency. Is he now a finished enough product to mount an assault on the Top 5?

Rachin Ravindra - Had quite a poor season in his inaugural season in 2024. Can he force his agenda a little more in 2026?

New Selections

Michael Bracewell - Always need a Kiwi in our List and this year's offering is well thought of Michael Bracewell. Question marks will arise around the amount of cricket he will fit in but he is undoubtably a quality player.

Sophie Ecclestone - Our fourth female Cricketer of all time and joining her international teammate on The List for 2026. Put aside some question marks over her fitness to one side and looks set to be a key feature in 2026.

Aiden Markram - Has long been on the longlist for these Lists but has never quite made it to the final 22...until this year. With his national team in the ascendancy it would be churlish to not include him.

Mehidy Hassan Miraz - Had a quietly very competent year this week. We have had two previous Bangladesh players; the hugely successful Shakib Al Hasan and the very unsuccessful Abdur Razzak. Which will MHM emulate?

Vaibhav Suryavanshi - Probably the most enigmatic pick of our 9 years doing this. There is A LOT of pressure on this 14 year old but it seems that he shrugs that off with aplomb. Will be fascinating to see where he ends up

Paul Walter - Simon Harmer's Essex team mate is coming in this year as a James Vince-alike. Unlikely to finish top like Vince did might push his county brethren hard.

Discarded

The most notable rejected player this year is Babar Azam who has featured in every version of these lists for the last 8 years and won it in 2020. Chamari Athapaththu is also let go after a very successful 2024. She was the first female player in our game. Annabel Sutherland is also let go - the highest ranked player to be unselected for 2026 after having finished 8th this year.

The other players who we are letting go this year include relative veteran Kane Williamson who is being kicked out for the third time. Two other players to have failed at their second time of asking are Jasprit Bumrah and Rishabh Pant who finished in the bottom 3 whilst Jaisal ends his two year spell. Other one hit wonders from this year are: Wanindu Hasaranga, Heinrich Klassen, Liam Livingstone, Jamie Smith, Suryakumar Yadav and Adam Zampa.

 

The Cricket List 2025 Round Up

 

Well that's that for the year then.

So:

1. Sam Curran – 5049
Cricketers of the Week – 5

Most common position– 26 weeks in 1st
Can’t begrudge Curran this one. This is his third year on the List and he has occasional very purple patches and then fades away but he has shown the stamina to push on and win by a not inconsiderable margin this time out.

Key Stat – Pooran ran him close on a couple of occasions but Curran’s 4132 points in short form cricket is the highest of anyone . He has spent half the year holding that spot.

2. Nat Sciver-Brunt – 4296
Cricketers of the Week – 6

Most common position – 14 weeks in 1st
For the second year in a row a female cricketer has spent the most time in top spot but then ended up finishing in silver medal position. Her total is still a very impressive one considering she spent a good two thirds of the year not bowling.

Key Stat – NSB scored the most One Day points. Only 15.58% of all total points were scored in that format.

3. Liam Dawson – 4061
Cricketers of the Week – 3

Most common position– 12 weeks in 3rd.
Probably our most consistent Cricketer in the Year. He has the most average average (if you get me) at 109.76. When he plays you are almost guaranteed a decent haul of points.

Key Stat – No cricketer played more cricket than Dawson’s 37 active weeks. 3 more than Curran in second place and 17 more than Rishabh Pant who played the least.


4. Jos Buttler - 3984
Cricketers of the Week – 6

Most common position– 14 weeks in 2nd.
Spent almost all the year in the Top 5 – never hitting top spot and only spending two weeks in 5th. Will perhaps feel hard done by at spending so long in 2nd to finish 3rd but that big gap at the end of the New Zealand tour did for him.
Key Stat: In a year with a preponderance of wicketkeepers, Buttler was the standout behind the wicket. He finished with 12 more catches than anyone else and joint highest Fielding Bonus points.

5. Ravindra Jadeja - 3966
Cricketers of the Week – 4

Most common position– 19 weeks in 5th.
It’s comical how long Jadeja spends in 5th position. This year he has spent 19 weeks in the fifth position having spent 8 there last year. Was the highest scoring red ball player this year with 2529 points; 768 more than Liam Dawson.
Key Stat: Finishes second in terms of average points per active week with 136.76. Last year he was third with 131.08. Of our nine players to feature in both years his average differential is the most consistent.

6. Nicholas Pooran – 3913
Cricketers of the Week – 4
Most common position – 14 weeks in 6th.
Now devoid of any national loyalties, Pooran was free to plough the franchise furrow… and what a fruitful harvest he had. Startingly at no point in 2025did Pooran drop any lower than 8th position.
Key Stat: Pooran was always going to be a big scorer in the Strike Rate category….however the level of this has been extraordinary. In the 4 years I have been tracking that metric nobody has breached 1000 SR points in a calendar year until now.

7. Phil Salt – 3821
Cricketers of the Week – 2
Most common position – 16 weeks in 8th
Followed a similar playbook to how he operated last year; pootle along unnoticed for 10 months and then hit the accelerator in that T20 Franchise section of the year. If it ain’t broke…..
Key Stat: With the freakish anomaly of Pooran who played nothing but T20 cricket, Salt’s 91.97% is the highest proportion of anybody.

8. Annabel Sutherland – 3460
Cricketer of the Weeks – 1
Most common position - 7 weeks in 7th
Really was hampered by the second longest spell of absence of anyone in the List however 7th is a more than serviceable score for a Rookie year. She is a young lady with an enormous amount of promise.
Key Stats – Nobody has occupied more positions than Sutherland. She was as high as 2nd at the end of March and as low as 20th in July.

9. Yashasvi Jaiswal – 3218
Cricketer of the Weeks – 3
Most common position - 10 weeks in 10th
Spent more weeks outside of the Top Ten than he did within it in what has been a bit of a topsy turvy year for the Indian youngster.
Key Stats – Runs was probably the tightest fought category with 6 people being separated by less than a hundred runs at the top. Jaiswal led us out on the final week with 2060.


10. Harry Brook – 3130
Cricketer of the Weeks – 2
Most common position - 13 weeks in 17th
Strange to say looking at a tenth place finish but this has been a disappointing year for Brook….obviously in terms of results as well as in terms of output. His average score in 2025 was 13.1 points fewer than the previous year. Not the trajectory you would have hoped for the young man.
Key Stats – Brook is the only player in our Top ten to have spent time in the bottom3 with 3 weeks as second bottom and one week at the foot of the List.

Rest of the list

11 Pathum Nissanka 3109
12 Kane Williamson 2913
13 Saim Ayub 2846
14 Chamari Athapaththu 2666
14 Jamie Smith 2665
15 Travis Head 2584
16 Babar Azam 2549
18 Liam Livingstone 2514
19 Heinrich Klaasen 2500
20 Wanindu Hasaranga 2463
21 Suryakumar Yadav 2263
22 Jasprit Bumrah 2078
23 Rishabh Pant 2053
24 Adam Zampa 1662

Nicholas Pooran - The Best Cricketer of the Week

 

Final Full Weekly Top 5

1. Nicholas Pooran - 221 - We are very much in the midst of franchise cricket mania with competitions in Australia, Bangladesh, Dubai and South Africa. Pooran played four times in two of these competitions. Still 141 is a good haul for his fourth Cricketer of the Week of the year.

2. Travis Head - 220 - One point behind this week's 'best' cricketer courtesy of another huge score in another huge Ashes success. Moves up from 17th to 15th in what has otherwise been an underwhelming year.

3. Sam Curran - 166 - Just on his usual T20 grind. 66 runs and a wicket in three games in the ILT20 sees him in the Top 5 once more.

4. Kane Williamson - 161 - Finished off a Test match before kicking off a T20 tournament in South Africa ...and did pretty well in both. 91 points from the red ball game and 70 from the white ball one.

5. Jamie Smith - 152 - Probably his least disappointing disappointment across The Ashes. 82 runs and 4 contributions in the field.

Overall Top 5 with 5 days Left of the Year

1. Sam Curran -4951 - 657 point lead on second place. All but wrapped up that Curran will join Buttler as the second Englishman to win our Cricketer of the Year.

2. Nat Sciver-Brunt - 4294 - Inactive but very comfortable for a second place finish this year. The second year in a row a female cricketer has taken the silver medal.

3. Liam Dawson - 4061 - Got the indignity of a zero point week this week....but is one of the players who will be in action this week so it least he won't round of his year with a blob. Provides a slight symmetry though as his second weekly score was a zero to go along with his second to last.

4. Jos Buttler- 3972 - Had been inactive for 6 weeks and dropped from 2nd to 5th but just 60 points non Friday for Durban sees him back up a spot to 4th....89 off a bronze medal.

5.Ravindra Jadeja - 3966 - Was not part of the Indian gang that joined up to play domestic cricket in the Vijay Hazare Trophy and thus drops down a place.

Ones To Watch

Only 161 points separate Jamie Smith, Chamari Athapaththu, Travis Head, Liam Livingstone and Henrich Klaasen. All will be active over the next 5 days so all to play for,

Other Movers

Babar Azam's mini-Renaissance continues as he rises up to 15th place.

Top 3 Averages

1. Sam Curran - 150.03 (Up from 149.53)
2. Ravindra Jadeja = 136.76
3. Nat Sciver-Brunt = 136.1

Travis Head's big score sees his average improve by 4.8 ....but at 90.21 he has the fourth worst of anyone. Phil Salt's bad week sees him drop 3.4 and move down to 115.28.

Top Players By Format

Red Ball -Ravindra Jadeja= 2529
One Day - Nat Sciver Brunt = 1484
Short Form - Sam Curran 4034

Top Players by Discipline

* = New Name

Runs - Yashasvi Jaiswal = 2060
Batting Bonus - Passum Nissanka = 440
Strike Rate – Nicholas Pooran = 1010

Wickets - Liam Dawson - 1640
Wicket Bonus - Ravindra Jadeja = 200
Economy - Ravindra Jadeja = 750

Fielding - Jos Buttler = 630
Fielding Bonus - Jamie Smith, Jos Buttler & Phil Salt – 40

Weekly List In Full

Nicholas Pooran 221
Travis Head 220
Sam Curran 166
Kane Williamson 161
Jamie Smith 152
Rishabh Pant 125
Harry Brook 125
Babar Azam 110
Jasprit Bumrah 70
Chamari Athapaththu 69
Jos Buttler 60
Saim Ayub 58
Heinrich Klaasen 53
Liam Livingstone 21
Adam Zampa 18
Phil Salt 10
Suryakumar Yadav 5
Liam Dawson 0

Wanindu Hasaranga dnp
Annabel Sutherland dnp
Ravindra Jadeja dnp
Yashasvi Jaiwal dnp
Nat Sciver-Brunt dnp
Pathum Nissanka dnp

Overall Scores In Full

1 Sam Curran 4951
2 Nat Sciver-Brunt 4294
3 Liam Dawson 4061
4 Jos Buttler 3972
5 Ravindra Jadeja 3966
6 Nicholas Pooran 3848
7 Phil Salt 3689
8 Annabel Sutherland 3460
9 Yashasvi Jaiwal 3218
10 Pathum Nissanka 3109
11 Harry Brook 3021
12 Kane Williamson 2911
13 Saim Ayub 2846
14 Jamie Smith 2630
15 Babar Azam 2549
16 Chamari Athapaththu 2532
17 Travis Head 2526
18 Liam Livingstone 2496
19 Heinrich Klaasen 2487
20 Wanindu Hasaranga 2463
21 Suryakumar Yadav 2263
22 Jasprit Bumrah 2078
23 Rishabh Pant 1977
24 Adam Zampa 1576