CMS International Cricket Awards 2019.

[Durhamfootman]

Harry and Meghan are already here.

Did they charge £50k for their participation or are those just Randy Andy's rates?

[Arthur Crabtree]

Live from the Davos Arena we are presenting the CMS cricket awards of 2019. We have been accommodated in a cleaners cupboard which is more spacious and comfortable than anything I am accustomed to, but I don't have a view of the stage, so I'm following this on Kevin Pietersen''s twitter feed, hence all the references to the white rhino which I will try to edit out.

Currently, the All New Beastie Boys (favourite cricket side, the New York Yankees) are being politely ushered from the stage in silence. As is fashionable, we have no compere for the night and any political speeches, even if promoting tax breaks and business class air travel, are forbidden. Let's do this.

[Arthur Crabtree]

Harry and Meghan are already here.

Did they charge £50k for their participation or are those just Randy Andy's rates?

If I started to give details about kickbacks to VIP guests, my cupboard would be instantly raided by the Davos riot police and tonight's results would remain unknown (to anyone not following KP's tweets). There is already a whiff of teargas around the seats of the competition winners.

[Arthur Crabtree]

As is the way at global awards when the alcohol is refreshed without petition and the diary for tomorrow erased should the worst happen, the early award winners are the best remembered. Like when the entire hall is sober enough to remember until death that a social realist Senegalese comedy won the best overseas film award whereas the destination of the (American) best film is a haze of things that may or may not have happened, like stuffing your wallet into the pocket of a homeless prostitute on Hollywood Boulevard on your way home, which coincidentally was the basic premise of the Senegalese comedy.

And so everyone tonight, from the minor royalty all the way down to topical actors and pop stars, in fact, everyone apart from cricket administrator who are staring at their phones and doing mental arithmetic, will remember that the CMS Associates Player of the Year for 2019 is Papua New Guinea's 23 year old left arm pace bowler NOSAINA POKANA. PNG regained ODI status in 2019 (having lost it during the 2018 World Cup qualifiers for which Nosaina was banned for a suspect bowling action) when he was top wicket taker in the qualifiers in Namibia.

And everyone will remember that the Women's Player of the Year was Australian veteran ELLYSE PERRY because she always is. She was phenomenal in 2019, with a ton and 76* in the drawn Women's Ashes in Taunton. In ODIs, she made a gutsy hundred against West Indies in Antigua and took a lifetime best 7-22 (beating the record for an Australian woman) against England in the Ashes. Two times ICC Women's Cricketer of the Year, and now back to back wins at CMS's.

[Durhamfootman]

Ooooh.... good start

Keep going..........you have nothing to worry about from the Davos riot police.... you'll easily outrun them. Those skis get in the way all the time, constantly tripping everyone up, getting caught up in the furniture and preventing the police from easily negotiating the revolving doors

[Arthur Crabtree]

I've heard that no one remembers the losers, but that is rarely true in international sport because the spectators are sentimental dreamers even if the performers are Darwinist winners with the cold calculating gaze of a gunfighter and the heart of an alligator. The CMS Captain of the Year is KANE WILLIAMSON, the man who had to walk his team past the World Cup on their way to collecting the runners up medals. Williamson's grace and generosity whether winning or losing is a given. But history would hardly take any rewriting at all if Cool Hand Kane had won the competition. It just needed a kinder rebound off Ben Stokes' behind. New Zealand were excellent in the World Cup, led by their captain's bat, and he took his side to second in the Test rankings.

The overwhelming winner of Young Player of the Year is JOFRA ARCHER who progressed from debutant in the second Ashes Test at Lord's to England's go-to gun bowler by the conclusion of the series. His menacing bouncer and genuine pace had almost all of the Australians rattled. His best moment was the 6-45 in the miracle of Leeds (more of this later) and he took a 6-fer in the series levelling win at The Oval. He took 30 wickets in seven games in his debut year and in the World Cup, was entrusted with the superover in the World Cup final. A World Cup winner at 24, he took 20 wickets in the competition, the most for his side, and with their best economy rate too.

[Arthur Crabtree]

Ooooh.... good start

Keep going..........you have nothing to worry about from the Davos riot police.... you'll easily outrun them. Those skis get in the way all the time, constantly tripping everyone up, getting caught up in the furniture and preventing the police from easily negotiating the revolving doors

Keystone Cops on skis.

[Arthur Crabtree]

Just a minute while we charge our cups with tea.

Next up is the Test bowling performance of the year.

[Durhamfootman]

Keystone Cops on skis.

An excellent title for a behind the scenes film about the ECB

[bigfluffylemon]

Thanks Arthur. Good stuff.

[Arthur Crabtree]

There is a rumour that a fortune has been made on this in Sharjah. Certainly I didn't see it coming. The Test Bowling Performance of 2019 is won by JASPRIT BUMRAH for his 5-7 off eight overs against West Indies in Antigua. After 12 Tests that have yielded 62 wickets since his debut in 2018, Jasprit averages 19.2 which is bettered since World War 1 only by Frank Tyson (50+wickets). In 2019, Jasprit helped his side to a landmark series win in Australia when he took 21 wickets in four Tests, easily the best paceman on show. At North Sound, West Indies were chasing 419 to win, the Gujurati paceman with the unique bowling style had the hosts at 50-9, picking up a five-fer to go with those already in Australia, South Africa and England.

I had a fiver on Tim Murtagh.

There was greater unanimity in the choice for Best Test Innings of the Year. It's a tough life though as everyone here will know. In February last year, cricket reporters around the world stood to acclaim Kusal Perera's matchwinning 153* in Durban to prevail against the odds in a last wicket thriller with Vishwa Fernando. And they compared Kusal's epic to Lara's all time great innings in Bridgetown against Australia in 1999. The tension. The last wicket stand.

By August, in Test cricket, everyone only wanted to talk about Ben Stokes' 135* in the Ashes, and his monumental hour long last wicket stand with Jack Leach, as England (or rather Stokes) chased 359 to win the Test. Stokes batted for five and a half hours, in an innings of two parts. First he blocked almost strokelessly. Then he hit the ball all around the ground in a display that was as much New Year at the Embankment as five day cricket. Of the 76 runs made for the last wicket, Leach added one. It was the Ashes and it was excruciating pressure. BEN STOKES wins the Best Test Innings of 2019 category. But it was a close run thing.

[Durhamfootman]

so far I've nailed every award that I voted for. So effective that I've been approached by the HFPA to replace the Bulgarian body builder who has been going a little off piste lately and started voting for things that weren't made in America

I have a feeling this run will come to an end once we get to the ODI categories.... everyone knows that a woman doesn't get a nomination from the HFPA.... even in the best actress category

[bigfluffylemon]

I'm 4/6. Went for Morgan over Kane as captain. Kane blotted his copybook in my eyes with an insipid captaincy performance in Australia. Choosing to bowl first at Melbourne was a dreadful decision.

[Durhamfootman]

5/5 for me

next up will not be Ellyse Perry's 7-22 against England at Canterbury, however

[Durhamfootman]

although it should be, imo