India spinner Varun Chakravarthy and U-19 Women’s team sensation Gongadi Trisha have been nominated for ICC’s men’s and women’s Player Of The Month awards for January on Thursday.
Varun and Trisha have been in sensational form for their respective teams in January. The mystery spinner rattled England during the T20I series against England while Trisha emerged as the architect of India’s victorious U-19 T20 World Cup campaign in Malaysia.
Varun, who made his return to international cricket after a three-year gap, displayed brilliant form ever since and the mystery spinner returned with 14 wickets, including a five-wicket haul in Rajkot, during the recently-concluded T20I series against England. Varun was adjudged as the Player Of The Series for his performance as India won 4-1 against Jos Buttler and his men.
Based on his performance, Varun was also included in the squad for the ODI series against England, and could also feature in the upcoming ICC Champions Trophy squad.
For the ICC men’s Player of the Month award, Varun faces tough competition from two other spinners — Pakistan’s Noman Ali and West Indies’ Jomel Warrican. Noman and Jomel are also in contention after their performance in the Test series between Pakistan and West Indies.
Noman created history as he became the first Pakistan spinner to take a hat-trick in Tests. Warrican topped the wicket-takers list in the series with 19 scalps to his name as West Indies won the second Test to level the rubber.
Trisha continues to shine
The 19-year-old Trisha put in an all-round performance for India as they won the women’s U-19 T20 World Cup. Trisha became the first player in the history of the competition to score a hundred as she hit 110 not out off 59 balls against Scotland before returning figures of 3 for 6 with her bowling in the same match.
In the final against South Africa, Trisha picked up figures of 3 for 15 besides scoring a blistering 44 off 33 balls to help India bag their second successive title.
Trisha faces competition from Beth Mooney and Karishma Ramharack for the award. Mooney was in inspirational form for Australia during their Ashes series win, especially in the T20Is. Ramharack performed well for the West Indies during their ODI series against Bangladesh.