ICC Men's Cricketer Of The Year: Pat Cummins Wins Sir Garfield Sobers Trophy Following Terrific 2023

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Australia captain Pat Cummins on Thursday (January 25) won the Sir Garfield Sobers Trophy for ICC Men's Cricketer of the Year as the International Cricket Council (ICC) concluded its announcements of ICC Awards 2023 winners.

Cummins beat off competition from compatriot Travis Head as well as Indian duo Virat Kohli and Ravindra Jadeja, as he was recognised as the outstanding crickete across all formats of international cricket in 2023, scooping the top award.

Cummins receives the award after a phenomenal year which saw him produce outstanding individual performances while also leading his side to the ICC World Test Championship and ICC Men's Cricket World Cup titles.

Cummins is the fifth Australian to win the Sir Garfield Sobers Trophy, following Ricky Ponting (2006 and 2007), Mitchell Johnson (2009 and 2014), Michael Clarke (2013) and Steve Smith (2015).

Cummins grabbed 42 wickets in 11 Tests during the year at an average of 27.50 with a best match haul of 10 for 47 in the Boxing Day Test against Pakistan. These notable contributions came as Australia claimed their maiden World Test Championship mace and retained the Ashes on English soil.

In ODIs, he grabbed 17 wickets in 13 matches at an economy rate of 5.74. His best figures of three for 51 against South Africa in the CWC23 semi-final was followed by a crucial spell of two for 34 against India in the blockbuster final in Ahmedabad.

Pat Cummins: "It's a huge honour. It has been a big year, lots of wonderful team success. To get this individual honour is huge and I am pretty amazed. In terms of individual accolades, it is right up there.

"All the other nominees obviously had fantastic years as well. Travis, as a team-mate, I saw him win the World Test Championship Final and the World Cup final, and he was the Player of the Match in both matches. He had an amazing year.

"Jadeja and Kohli are both super consistent. They find a way to drag their team out of trouble and win it for them, so to win alongside those guys is really special."

This concluded the ICC awards 2023 following four days of announcements on ICC official channels, where Teams of the Year and individual award winners in 13 categories had been unveiled since Monday.

Winners in the ICC Awards were determined from votes cast by an independent panel of prominent media representatives - the ICC Voting Academy - and hundreds of thousands of global cricket fans, who had been voting for their top performers in 2023 since early January.

Earlier, England all-rounder Nat Sciver-Brunt won her second successive Rachael Heyhoe Flint Trophy for ICC Women's Cricketer of the Year, beating off competition from Sri Lanka's Chamari Athapaththu and Australian pair Ash Gardner and Beth Mooney.

Australia's Usman Khawaja, India's Virat Kohli, Sri Lanka captain Chamari Athapaththu, umpire Richard Illingworth and players from Zimbabwe were among the others to celebrate individual accolades in the ICC Awards 2023 through Thursday's announcements.