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Not top of my list either.

Kohli is becoming a legend of Indian cricket. On his day nobody can beat the elfin Indian captain - however it is rapidly looking like that he will finish fourth in our list for the second year on the Trott. His 159 points accrued this week from innings of 19 and 70 against his favourite team - the West Indies - has pulled him 185 points away from fifth placed Joe Root. With two weeks left in the year it seems likely that Kohli will get at least fourth placed in the overall List for the year. Root has warm up matches and the first Test against South Africa whilst Kohli has further ODIs against West Indies - his favoured format against his favourite team. So with the chasing pack out of the picture we start to look upwards. Stalwart of our list, Jeetan Patel is a full 370 points ahead of Kohli and has just started his campaign for Wellington in the Super Smash with three wickets and a third place finish for the week. Whilst T20 is not Patel's favoured format, he will play enough games and has enough of a cushion to ensure that he can hold Kohli off. In fact, he is 345 points away from second placed Simon Harmer so it is not out of the question that Harmer, who will now be inactive for the last two weeks, may drop to third. One thing that is becoming increasingly clear is that Glenn Maxwell is very likely to be our star man for 2019.

This year's Cricket List has brought about an abundance of times when our top 5 for the week have featured a plethora of Indian talent. There have only been 20 weeks of the year where an Indian player has not made the weekly top 5 and this week is the sixth occasion where three Indian players feature - as Rohit Sharma and Shubman Gill join Kohli. Rohit bagged another half century in the first T20 against the West Indies and in doing so became the latest player to leapfrog the disgraced Shakib Al Hasan. Sharma is now 8th with Rashid Khan 154 above him. Rashid is about to join up with Adelaide for some T20 action in the BBL so there could still be a bit of a tussle between the two of them to see who can jostle their way to finish just outside the top 5. Further down the list you will find Shubman Gill. A player whose top five aspirations died out many a moon ago. Shubman has been a frustrating prospect this year. When he plays he registers good scores - averaging 96 points across his 28 active weeks. However it is those 22 inactive weeks that really held him back. If he played as many weeks as this week's top Cricketer, Virat Kohli, he would have had 3456, enough to boost his position six places and be just outside the top ten. Instead he has to satisfy himself with overtaking Shai Hope into 18th position. He is undoubtably a decent Cricketer but his position in next year's list is in question thanks to his lack of cricket.

When it is clear that a player won't make the top ten summary on New Year's Eve and may not make the List for the next year, I feel that it is nice to offer something of a cricketing obituary for one of our soon to be departed brethren. Morne Morkel was a debutant to our list this year and is unlikely to feature next year after a disappointing year for Surrey, surprisingly salvaged by a burst of T20 form that helped his Tshwane side reach the final of the MSL. Barely mentioned in these posts for the bulk of the year, I have been forced to dedicate some time to him over the last few weeks due to his spurt up the table. At the start of the MSL, the veteran South African was in 17th; he finishes it in joint 14th and 322 points better off with a game still to play. Short of a legendary performance in the final, Morkel will finish the year as one of four players that did not win Cricketer of the Week in 2019 (alongside Jos Buttler, Jack Leach and Kane Williamson) and will have achieved a fairly nondescript year of cricket. His highest scoring week of 2019 came in Week 23 where he got 252 points through a seven wicket haul against Somerset. I think it very fitting that Surrey did not win that match and he did not feature in the write up for that week. If you do not feature in 2020, goodbye Morne - the invisible man of the 2019 campaign.

Week

Virat Kohli - 159
Rohit Sharma- 146
Jeetan Patel - 120
Shubman Gill - 68
Morne Morkel - 60
Mohammad Abbas - 50
Kuldeep Yadav - 40
Shreyas Iyer - 20
Callum Ferguson - 13

Shakib Al Hassan - dnp
Jonny Bairstow- dnp
Jos Buttler - dnp
Joe Burns - dnp
Simon Harmer - dnp
Shai Hope - dnp
Rashid Khan - dnp
Jack Leach - dnp
Glenn Maxwell - dnp
Duanne Olivier - dnp
Wayne Parnell - dnp
Joe Root - dnp
Abdur Razzak - dnp
Ben Stokes - dnp
Kane Williamson - dnp

Overall

Glenn Maxwell - 5712
Simon Harmer - 5115
Jeetan Patel - 4770
Virat Kohli- 4400
Joe Root- 4215
Ben Stokes - 4174
Rashid Khan - 4124
Rohit Sharma - 3970
Shakib Al Hasan -3862
Jonny Bairstow - 3725
Shreyas Iyer - 3566
Jos Buttler - 3084
Duanne Olivier - 3021
Callum Ferguson - 2760
Morne Morkel - 2760
Wayne Parnell - 2743
Kane Williamson - 2733
Shubman Gill - 2688
Shai Hope - 2659
Jack Leach - 2598
Mohammad Abbas - 2149
Abdur Razzak- 1925
Kuldeep Yadav - 1800
Joe Burns - 1613

Headlines

Ian overtakes Andy in the only reshuffle of our cabinet

Very few definitely safe places as we go into the final weeks of term.

Week

Ian - 160
Sussex - 159
MIB - 146
DC - 68
RD - 60
DFM - 50
The Professor - 20
Alviro - 13
Andy - 0
Arthur - 0
GG - 0
RDJ - 0

Overall

RD - 8472
MIB - 7690
Arthur - 7335
DFM - 7264
Sussex - 7130
DC - 6862
GG-AS - 6752
Ian - 6520
Andy - 6493
Alviro- 5440
The Professor- 5187
RDJ - 5016

hard to believe that this has been running for nearly 2 years

good work Prof

Kuldeep has been an absolute disaster of a selection !!

I would reckon at least 3 other players called Yadav might have scored better...

Jeetan Patel is going to retire this month, I think. Initially just with Wellington, because he's going to become England's spin coach, but next year seems certain to be his last in county cricket

unless I've misunderstood, of course

Stepped down as Warwickshire captain but Rhodes talked about learning from him......so .....unsure

It does half the amount of games he'll play in a season so might put question Marks on him for next year.....unless anyone wants to gamble on his CC form alone.

that's up to Ian, of course. I know what I would have done if Jeets had decided this 12 months ago

are you planning to continue this next year, Prof? If so when can we expect to begin with the bidding?

[quote="Durhamfootman"]are you planning to continue this next year, Prof? If so when can we expect to begin with the bidding?[/quote

This Friday: people sign on, choose their retained players and send their shortlist

Friday 27th: The Draw

groovy

He's back
https://www.espncricinfo.com/series/804 ... ue-2019-20

It's a second Cricketer of the Week accolade for Shai Hope this week. It has seemed like a difficult year for the West Indian but he is looking like he might finish in rather a more comfortable position than it might have looked previously. Hope was a player that we expected quite a lot for in the World Cup however he failed to deliver; adding just 695 points despite a very promising looking couple of warm up games against Ireland and Bangladesh that saw him bag his inaugural spot at the top of the weekly List. This week saw two hefty innings from the Barbadian and he also managed to couple it with one score that bothered the strike rate column - long an issue for him. His yield of 260 points has seen him move up the list in something of a prodigious fashion as he overtakes Shubman Gill, Wayne Parnell, Morne Morkel, Callum Ferguson and Kane Williamson to finish the penultimate week of the year in 14th. If looked at purely statistically his year also doesn't look too shabby compared to the rest on our List. He joins the ranks of some fairly illustrious players who have scored Cricketer of the Week twice in 2019 - Rashid Khan, currently 8th overall, Jeetan Patel (3rd) and Joe Root (5th) have also scored a brace over the year. Not bad company to be in. In real world rankings he's deceptively good too. He is sandwiched between fellow List members Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli in second place for overall ODI runs scored. But is that enough to see him feature in our list for 2020?

Two Indian players have made a last push to breech the next stage of the List in the last week. If it was not for Joe Root's 72* for England against a Cricket South Africa Invitation XI, Rohit Sharma would have made his debut in the top five of the overall List for the first time in 2019. What a time to have done that and with what a performance. His stonking score of 159 in the second ODI against the West Indies was slightly let down by his underbaked total in the first match in Chennai allowing Shai Hope to pip him into second for the week. It was still enough for him to overtake the only barely active duo of Ben Stokes and Rashid Khan and drop into sixth position. Probably a bigger achievement is that of Shreyas Iyer. Seven weeks ago Iyer was in 19th position and, like Hope, you would probably have said that his season was underwhelming. However he has had something of a renaissance when he slides on the blue shirt of India and has increased his total by 789 points in the last two months. It is now unthinkable that an ODI team will go forward without Shreyas Iyer holding up the middle order. If he gets 31 runs or more in his next match he will be the quickest player to reach 500 ODI runs for India. A player who can only get better in 2020, one would think.

Kane Williamson. What to do with Kane Williamson? One of the premier batsmen in the world. The captain of New Zealand. A staple of the IPL. The third best Test batsman, the sixth best ODI batsman, the 23rd best T20I batsman. One of the most aesthetically pleasing batsmen to watch. But a damp squib on The Cricket List for two years now. A mere 58 points from his first Test against Australia takes his average for points gained in an active week to 107 from 26 weeks. His total of 2791 from the year is hugely down on his 2018 total of 4251 - a total that was buoyed up by an almost constant inclusion in Yorkshire's County Championship season. This week's meagre total saw him overtake Morne Morkel and Wayne Parnell - and he will be lucky to swell his position any further from his 16th paced spot due to 15th place being occupied by Callum Ferguson who is on fire for the Sydney Thunder in the BBL. So what to do with a problem like Williamson? Our list is supposed to be a list of the very best players in the world but when one of those is marginally better than Morne Morkel, whose form this year has been dubious at best, does he justify his place? It is a genuinely troublesome quandary.

Week

Shai Hope - 260
Rohit Sharma - 255
Shreyas Iyer - 223
Joe Root - 172
Glenn Maxwell - 143
Callum Ferguson - 137
Kuldeep Yadav - 120
Joe Burns - 82
Kane Williamson - 58
Jeetan Patel - 42
Jos Buttler - 35
Virat Kohli - 24
Jonny Bairstow- 13
Shubman Gill - 10
Ben Stokes - 10
Jack Leach - 0
Morne Morkel - 0

Mohammad Abbas - dnp
Shakib Al Hasan - dnp
Simon Harmer - dnp
Rashid Khan - dnp
Duanne Olivier - dnp
Wayne Parnell - dnp
Abdur Razzak - dnp

Overall

Glenn Maxwell - 5855
Simon Harmer - 5115
Jeetan Patel - 4813
Virat Kohli- 4429
Joe Root- 4423
Rohit Sharma - 4225
Ben Stokes - 4184
Rashid Khan - 4124
Shakib Al Hasan -3862
Shreyas Iyer - 3789
Jonny Bairstow - 3738
Jos Buttler - 3119
Duanne Olivier - 3021
Shai Hope - 2919
Callum Ferguson - 2897
Kane Williamson - 2791
Morne Morkel - 2760
Wayne Parnell - 2743
Shubman Gill - 2698
Jack Leach - 2598
Mohammad Abbas - 2149
Abdur Razzak- 1925
Kuldeep Yadav - 1920
Joe Burns - 1695

Headlines

As we approach the end it seems like the only real battle is between Andy, GG and Ian for places seven through nine.

RD is booking the open topped bus.

Week

The Professor- 305
MIB - 268
Andy - 260
Arthur - 207
Ian - 162
RD - 143
Alviro - 137
Sussex - 82
DC - 20
DFM - 0
GG - 0
RDJ - 0

Overall

RD - 8615
MIB - 7958
Arthur - 7542
DFM - 7264
Sussex - 7212
DC - 6882
Andy - 6753
GG-AS - 6752
Ian - 6682
Alviro- 5577
The Professor- 5492
RDJ - 5016

Good work, Prof

meninblue wrote:Hope both of my players cross 4000 points each

Looks like Jonny will fall bit short of 4000 points.