AB, Steyn dominate CSA Award nominations

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Cricket365
May 8, 2014

Proteas stars AB de Villiers and Dale Steyn head the list of nominees for the 2013 Cricket South Africa (CSA) professional awards, to be announced at a banquet in Johannesburg on Wednesday, 4 June.

The Proteas ODI captain and the world's leading Test match bowler are two of the five nominees for the main award – the South African Cricketer of the Year. The other nominees are Test and ODI batsmen, Hashim Amla and JP Duminy, and ODI wicketkeeper/batsman, Quinton de Kock.

De Villiers has also been nominated for the Test Cricketer of the Year award and the One-Day International Cricketer of the Year.

Steyn has also been nominated for Test Cricketer of the Year, the T20 International Cricketer of the Year and the KFC So Good Award and remarkably has all three nominations for the RAM Delivery of the Year.

None of De Villiers, Duminy and De Kock has previously being named South African Cricketer of the Year so there could well be a first-time winner of CSA's most prestigious award.

De Kock and Duminy also have two nominations each as the former has been nominated for the ODI gong and the latter for the T20 top award.

The awards cover the period from May 1, 2013 to April 30, 2014. This period covers two ICC events – the Champions Trophy and the World Twenty20 – as well as the Proteas' tours to Sri Lanka where they won the T20 series and to the UAE against Pakistan where they won both limited overs series, as well as the home series against Pakistan, India and Australia.

"The individual performances have once again been riveting and are too many to mention," commented CSA Chief Executive, Haroon Lorgat. "This naturally puts extra demands on our eminent panel of judges who have the tough job of deciding the final winner in each of the various international categories.

"I am tempted, though, to mention the century scored by Jacques Kallis in his final Test match and the double century scored by Graeme Smith against Pakistan. And then, of course, Dale Steyn's bowling contributions in just about every Test match and also the three successive ODI centuries by the young Quinton de Kock are also worthy of being mentioned."

All five nominees will be strong contenders for the Cricketer of the Year award. Even by his own high standards, it was an exceptional year for De Villiers, who at one stage was ranked the world's best batsman in both Test matches and one-day internationals. He was South Africa's leading run-scorer in both forms of the game and although he did not achieve the same consistency in Twenty20 internationals his dazzling innings of 69 not out off 28 balls against England was mainly responsible for earning South Africa a place in the World T20 semi-finals.

Steyn produced mesmerizing spells for South Africa in all forms of international cricket. He was once again his country's leading bowler in Tests but, despite his limited overs workload being managed to enable him to remain fit and fresh, he was highly effective when he played. He took 23 wickets at an average of 8.82 despite playing in only seven one-day internationals and was the go-to man during the World T20 in Bangladesh.

Not since De Villiers burst on to the scene has a young player made such a dramatic impact at international level as De Kock. Having made his debut for South Africa at the age of 19 during the 2012/13 season, he established himself in both the one-day and T20 international teams in the dual roles of opening batsman and wicketkeeper. He made his Test debut as a late replacement in the second Test against Australia and showed in his second innings of 34 that he was not out of his depth.

Amla had another solid year. He was second behind De Villiers in the Test averages with 429 runs at an average of 42.90 and contributed 621 runs at 38.81 in one-day internationals. Despite concerns that he might not be best suited to the requirements of Twenty20 internationals, he scored 185 runs in the World T20 as an opening batsman, with an average of 37.00 and a strike rate of 131.20.

Duminy was South Africa's leading T20 run-scorer and was third behind De Villiers and De Kock in ODI's. He made a century which contributed to South Africa's win in the second Test against Australia. His off-spin bowling was a valuable second string. Only Steyn and Vernon Philander took more than his 15 wickets in Tests.

The full list of nominees (in alphabetical order) is:

INTERNATIONAL

South African Cricketer of the Year: Hashim Amla, Quinton de Kock, AB de Villiers, JP Duminy, Dale Steyn. Castle Lager Test Cricketer of the Year: AB de Villiers, Faf du Plessis, Dale Steyn. Castle Lager One-Day International Cricketer of the Year: Quinton de Kock, AB de Villiers, Ryan McLaren. Blue Label Telecoms T20 International Cricketer of the Year: JP Duminy, Imran Tahir, Dale Steyn. KFC So Good Award: Jacques Kallis, David Miller, Dale Steyn. Momentum Women's Cricketer of the Year: Mignon du Preez, Shabnim Ismail, Marizanne Kapp

DOMESTIC

Sunfoil Series Cricketer of the Season: Justin Ontong, Dane Piedt, Stiaan van Zyl (all Nashua Mobile Cape Cobras). Momentum One-Day Cup Cricketer of the Season: Craig Alexander (Sunfoil Dolphins), Justin Kemp (Nashua Mobile Cape Cobras), Heino Kuhn (The Unlimited Titans) RAM SLAMMER of the Season: Kyle Abbott (Sunfoil Dolphins), Beuran Hendricks (Nashua Mobile Cape Cobras), David Miller (Sunfoil Dolphins) CSA Coach of the Year: Paul Adams (Nashua Mobile Cape Cobras), Lance Klusener (Sunfoil Dolphins), Rob Walter (The Unlimited Titans) CSA Umpire of the Year: Johan Cloete, Shaun George, Adrian Holdstock. CSA Groundsman of the Year: Rupert Bailey (Boland Park), Wilson Ngobese (Sahara Stadium Kingsmead), Nico Pretorius (Chevrolet Park)