Smriti Mandhana Amongst The Four Nominees For 2021 ICC Women's T20 Player Of The Year Award

India women’s team star batter Smriti Mandhana has been nominated along with three other cricketers for the coveted ICC Women’s T20 Player of the Year 2021 on Thursday, December 30, 2021.

The ICC Awards 2021 will recognize the outstanding achievements and feats in cricket over the past year. The winners of the awards will be announced in January 2022. Previously the ICC has announced the nominees for the ICC Women’s ODI Player of the Year 2021 which saw the likes of Lizelle Lee (South Africa), Tammy Beaumont (England), Hayley Mathews (West Indies), and Fatima Sana (Pakistan) being nominated for the award.

Smriti Mandhana was nominated for a terrific outing in T20Is for India in 2021. She scored 255 runs in nine matches at an average of 31.87 with two half-centuries. In a year that saw India win only two of the nine T20Is, Smriti Mandhana was one of their few bright spots.

She was the star for India in one of those victories which came against South Africa as India chased down 113 runs and she scored 48 off just 28 balls, helping the Girls in the Blue avoid a clean sweep in the three-match series.

Mandhana was India’s top run-scorer in the T20I series against England with 119 runs, top-scoring in both the matches that India lost including a 51-ball 70 that went in vain in the final T20I. Her second half-century came against Australia which India lost as well.

Other Nominees: Tammy Beaumont, Nat Sciver And Gaby Lewis

Apart from Smriti Mandhana, the other three women’s cricketers nominated for the 2021 ICC Women’s T20 Player Of The Year Award were England’s Tammy Beaumont, Nat Sciver, and Gaby Lewis of Ireland.

Tammy Beaumont made 303 runs in nine matches at an average of 33.66 with three half-centuries for England. She was England’s highest run-getter in the year in T20Is and third-highest overall in the world.

Beaumont was the top scorer and was awarded the Player of the Series for 102 runs in three matches against New Zealand. When New Zealand visited England, Beaumont top-scored once again with 113 runs in the series, including a stunning 97 in the opening game of the series.

Her England teammate Nat Sciver was nominated for her 153 runs in nine matches at an average of 19.12 with one fifty; 10 wickets at an average of 20.20 and an economy rate of 6.51. Nat Sciver played a prominent role in all three of England’s series wins this year, finishing as their third-highest run-getter and wicket-taker in T20Is in 2021.

Ireland’s Gaby Lewis made 325 runs at 40.62 in 10 T20Is with a strike rate of 128.45, with one century and a half-century. She was the second-highest run-scorer in T20Is this year and was the major reason why Ireland won two series wins, bagging the Player of the Match award twice in Ireland’s 3-1 series win over Scotland at home.

She made history at the ICC Women’s T20 World Cup Europe Qualifier in August, becoming the first female cricketer from Ireland to score a T20I hundred, a 105* against Germany.

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