Ellyse Perry has cleaned up at the ICC player of the decade awards, taking out all three women’s awards, while Steve Smith was named the Test Player of the Decade.
Perry swept the Women’s T20I Cricketer of the Decade, the Women’s ODI Cricketer of the Decade and ICC Female Cricketer of the Decade in a stunning sweep.
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The 30-year-old has achieved it all in her career, hitting 4349 International runs, taking 213 wickets, four T20 World Cups and the 2013 50-over World Cup title for Australia.
Having beamed in to the awards due to COVID, Perry sent a message and she praised the rise of the women’s game around the world.
“It has been tremendous to develop the women’s T20 game and take it forward. Amazing to see where it’s come from when I was introduced to it,” she said.
“A competition like the WBBL has had such a big impact not only on the professional game but the amount of young people and young girls in particular wanting to take up the sport.”
The humble champion said “I may not be the most dynamic of T20 players out there” but was a popular winner of the award.
On the mens side, Smith was named the Test player of the decade with India’s Virat Kohli taking out the ODI award and Afghanistan’s Rashid Khan the T20I cricketer of the 2010s.
Kohli was also named the men’s cricketer of the decade.
But Smith is also in the midst of a stunning form slump.
The 31-year-old debuted in 2010 against Pakistan, famously as a leg spinner, but quickly turned into Australia’s most reliable middle order presence piling on an incredible record.
During the awards period, Smith hit 7040 Test runs at an average of 65.79, which was the second highest of all-time, behind only the great Donald Bradman.
But it comes after a day where his quirky batting style saw the star dismissed for 8, bringing his tally in four innings in the series against India to 10 with an average of 3.33.
He was dismissed bowled by a ball that clipped leg stump as he moved right across his crease by Jasprit Bumrah today.
It’s also seen his average drop to 61.33, dropping into third with Adam Voges’ average of 61.87 in 20 Test matches back into second place.
But despite being suspended for a year and being stripped of the Australian captaincy during the infamous ball tampering scandal, there was only ever going to be one winner.
It comes after nine Australians were named in the teams of the decade yesterday.
David Warner and Smith were both included in the Men’s Test Team of the Decade, with the pair collectively scoring 14,471 runs and 50 centuries in the game’s longest format during the adjudicated period.
Warner was named in the Men’s ODI Team of the Decade alongside Australian teammate Mitchell Starc, who was the highest wicket-taker in consecutive 50-over World Cups in 2015 and 2019.
Meanwhile, Australian one-day captain Aaron Finch and white-ball powerhouse Glenn Maxwell were both included in the Men’s T20I Team of the Decade.
Indian superstar Virat Kohli was the only player to feature in all three men’s sides.
Meg Lanning, Alyssa Healy and Perry were unsurprising additions in the Women’s ODI Team of the Decade, with the trio collectively scoring 8464 runs and 19 centuries in the 50-over format.