Clarke is Australia's Player of the Year

[reverse_swing]

Michael Clarke has been named Australia's Player of the Year at the annual Allan Border Medal count in Melbourne. Damien Martyn won the Test Player of the Year honour, and Andrew Symonds is ODI Player of the Year.

Clarke, 23, polled 54 of the votes, ahead of fellow batsman Damien Martyn (51) and wicketkeeper-batsman Adam Gilchrist (41) in third. The votes were cast by teammates, media and umpires in Australia's Test and one-day matches over the past year. Among his outstanding performances were Test centuries in his first matches both away and at home, 6 for 9 in India and two one-day centuries as an opener.

Votes were cast from Australia's tours of Sri Lanka, Zimbabwe, Europe and India last year, last year's home winter series against Sri Lanka and the home summer against New Zealand, Pakistan and West Indies. Damien Martyn was rewarded with the Test Player of the Year award for striking two centuries and a 97 against India, and two unbeaten centuries against Pakistan.

Symonds pipped Clarke and the fast bowler Michael Kasprowicz to the honour of being named ODI Player of the Year. All three players got 15 votes, but Symonds took the honours as he was ajudged his side's best player across four matches, while Clarke was best in three and Kasprowicz's votes came from just two games.

Strong performances from Symonds, 29, in Australia's 3-2 victory against Sri Lanka in March helped him to win the title. He took 2 for 34 and struck 40 runs in the fifth match at Colombo.

Clarke, however, may consider himself unlucky not to have taken the award. He struck two centuries and a 97, as well as taking 5 for 35 against Sri Lanka, while the eventual winner Symonds rounded off his season with a disappointing run of five ducks in six innings in the VB series against Pakistan and West Indies.

Winners
Australian One-Day Player of the Year - Andrew Symonds
Australian State Player of the Year - Andy Bichel
Australian Young Player of the Year - Mark Cosgrove
Australian Woman Player of the Year - Karen Rolton
Australian Test Player of the Year - Damien Martyn
Australian Cricketer of the Year - Michael Clarke

-Cricinfo

Edited on, February 1, 2005, 2:14 AM GMT, by reverse_swing.

[reverse_swing]

Clarke's career statistics:

TESTS
 (including 02/01/2005)
                      M    I  NO  Runs   HS     Ave     SR 100  50   Ct  St
Batting & Fielding    9   14   1   631  151   48.53  57.67   2   2   12   0

                      O      M     R    W    Ave   BBI    5  10    SR  Econ
Bowling              10.2    0    37    6   6.16  6-9     1   0  10.3  3.58

ONE-DAY INTERNATIONALS
 (including 30/01/2005)
                      M    I  NO  Runs   HS     Ave     SR 100  50   Ct  St
Batting & Fielding   42   38  10  1306  105*  46.64  90.56   2   7   18   0

                      O      M     R    W    Ave   BBI   4w  5w    SR  Econ
Bowling              98.5    1   509   17  29.94  5-35    1   1  34.8  5.15

-Cricinfo

[bourny3]

The young player of the year- Mark Cosgrove is in poor form at the moment and has averaged about 10 this season. He didnt deserve it.

[Darkwarrior]

Definetly the player of the year and he performed even better than amits sehwag

[bourny3]

I wouldnt say definitely as Martyn hit 6 centuries in tests and played dam well in some of the ODIs he would be very upset that he didnt get it.

[chyicarus]

Martyn has a tremendous year- but Clarkey being the rookie got more votes- becoz of his flamboyance and youthful exhuberance! Clarkey is my second favorite batsman after Ricky and I think he's going to be a real asset for the Australian team in the future and might be play an important role as a vice-captain and captain of the Aussies!

[bourny3]

The Alan Border medal was decided not only by votes in the ODIs and Tests but the media and umpires had votes. Clarke killed Martyn in these types of votes because obviously the Media liked the young star instead of the older battler.

[fab]

I heard that Damien Martyn isn't really well liked. Apparently one of the reasons he wasn't playing for a long period during the 90s was because he called Mark Taylor a 'fat bastard'. *shrug*

[chyicarus]

that is one hell of a funny comment i've heard in ages!!!
Aussies have a habit of cussing each other out- its nothing really serious. He just didn't get in the team becoz of class players like the Waugh brothers, Bevan etc etc. Even Lehmann had to score over 10,000 first class run before he got his first Test call!

[chowdhurynaheed]

Locking this thread for a few hours.cuz ChyMan is a [] from banglacricket

Edited on, February 2, 2005, 9:24 AM GMT, by nasif.
Reason: Rule violation

[chyicarus]

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[chowdhurynaheed]

ab aya sala line par!

[chyicarus]

[chowdhurynaheed]

now u realise dun start nuthin when u cnt back it up

[bourny3]

Well taylor is quite fat. Whats the deal with Chyman and chowdhurynaheed whats happening? I dont know. lol

[battye]

Clarke is a star, he deserved the medal. There is a apparantly a round robin Twenty20 tournament coming up I read in the paper, with three captains: Ponting, Gilchrist, Clarke.

That says to me, they see Clarke as leadership material, and when Gilly retires, he will be the vice-captain.

[bourny3]

where did you see this battye. Are you from Australia.