ICC Awards 2014: Mitchell Johnson Cricketer of the Year, Gary Ballance Honoured
Australian bowler Mitchell Johnson has been named the 2014 ICC Cricketer of the Year after posting a slew of impressive performances for the Baggy Greens over the past 12 months.
Johnson's triumph was announced by the governing body's Twitter account:
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The 33-year-old toppled Sri Lanka's Kumar Sangakkara and Angelo Mathews, plus South Africa's AB de Villiers, to land the main prize at the annual LG ICC Awards. "Some of the greats of the game have been nominated and won this award and it's a very special honour," said Johnson, per ICC-cricket.com.
Cricket statistician Mazher Arshad highlighted the pedigree of Johnson's success:
Johnson also picked up the Test Player of the Year accolade after destroying England during last winter's Ashes series, as reported by ABC. Johnson took 37 wickets across five matches—15 more than closest team-mate Ryan Harris—to average a success every 13.97 runs in the whitewash series win, per BBC Sport.
It wasn't all bad news for the English, however, as Gary Ballance picked up the Emerging Cricketer of the Year award, as noted by the ICC's feed:
The left-handed batsman, who plies his trade with Yorkshire, scored three Test centuries during his first season on the international scene, per Sky Sports. The full rundown of winners can be seen below:
| ICC Cricketer of the Year | Mitchell Johnson |
| ICC Test Cricketer of the Year | Mitchell Johnson |
| ICC Women’s ODI Cricketer of the Year | Sarah Taylor |
| ICC ODI Cricketer of the Year | AB de Villiers |
| ICC Emerging Cricketer of the Year | Gary Ballance |
| ICC Associate and Affiliate Cricketer of the Year | Preston Mommsen |
| ICC Twenty20 International Performance of the Year | Aaron Finch |
| ICC T20I Women’s Cricketer of the Year | Meg Lanning |
| ICC Spirit of Cricket Award | Katherine Brunt |
| ICC Umpire of the Year | Richard Kettleborough |
| LG People’s Choice | Bhuvneshwar Kumar |
These announcements come days after the ICC named the Test and ODI teams of the year. Record-breaker Rohit Sharma—who hit an incredible 264 during Thursday's fourth ODI against Sri Lanka, per Andrew Fidel Fernando of ESPN Cricinfo—was one of four Indians to be named in the discipline's Team of the Year, as noted below:
| David Warner (Aus) | Mohammad Hafeez (Pak) |
| Kane Williamson (NZ) | Quinton de Kock (SA) |
| Kumar Sangakkara (SL) | Virat Kohli (Ind) |
| AB de Villiers (SA) (wicketkeeper) | George Bailey (Aus) |
| Joe Root (Eng) | AB de Villiers (SA) |
| Angelo Mathews (SL) (captain) | MS Dhoni (Ind) (wicketkeeper) (captain) |
| Mitchell Johnson (Aus) | Dwayne Bravo (WI) |
| Stuard Broad (Eng) | James Faulkner (Aus) |
| Dale Steyn (SA) | Dale Steyn (SA) |
| Rangana Herath (SL) | Mohammad Shami (Ind) |
| Tim Southee (NZ) | Ajantha Mendis (SL) |
| Ross Taylor (NZ) (12th man) | Rohit Sharma (Ind) (12th man) |
Johnson's headline-grabbing triumph is closely followed by De Villiers' success, after he picked up the ODI individual prize and appeared in both Team of the Year selections.
One has to wonder if Rohit would have toppled Aaron Finch for the performance gong if he had posted his record-breaking feat before the eve of the awards. Still, the Indian star now has a major reason to try to surpass 200 ODI runs for the third time.
Johnson will have the opportunity to underline his class once more with the return of the Ashes in 2015, a series which sees Australia try to retain the urn on English soil.
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