Bangladesh star allrounder Shakib Al Hasan has been nominated for the International Cricket Council’s Men’s ODI Player of the Year award.
Along with him, Pakistan captain Babar Azam, South African batter Janneman Malan, and Ireland batter Paul Stirling have also been named for the same.
Shakib is the only allrounder among the nominees. In the pandemic-hit year, Shakib batted in nine matches and scored 277 runs with two fifties. He also bagged 17 wickets. Shakib’s bowling performance is keeping him ahead of the other nominees.
2021 was the year when Bangladesh allrounder made a comeback after serving a ban imposed on him by the ICC due to failing to report corrupt approaches made to him by the bookies.
Shakib started a challenging year with the home series against the West Indies and emerged player of the series. Right before that series, he participated in the inaugural Bangabandhu T20 Cup at the domestic level but failed to impress. That was his first competitive cricket event after the ban ends.
After the home series against West Indies, Shakib played against Sri Lanka as well but failed to continue on a good run. He returned to his true form against Zimbabwe when he amassed 145 runs in three ODIs and bagged eight wickets— which help him to earn the second player of the series award in the same calendar year.
While Shakib shone both with ball and bat, Babar, the Pakistan captain did well with the bat scoring 405 in six matches with two centuries, and Janneman also batted superbly scoring 509 in eight matches with two centuries, and Paul also did well with the bat amassing 705 runs in 14 ODIs he played in the year with three centuries and two fifties— which was also the highest run by any batters in the format in the calendar year of 2021.
SOURCE: UNITED NEWS OF BANGLADESH