Operating at a level rarely seen in the game before, India's peerless fast bowler Jasprit Bumrah was on Monday nominated for the ICC Men's Cricketer of the Year award and also featured in the list for the best player in the Test format.
Bumrah, who has left the Australian batters scrambling for survival with his incredible display of fast bowling in the ongoing five-match series Down Under, has been nominated for the top award, named after legendary West Indies all-rounder Sir Garfield Sobers, alongside England's prolific duo of Joe Root and Harry Brook, with swashbuckling Australian batter Travis Head completing the list.
Apart from Bumrah, who has been in excellent form all of 2024, the other cricketers to feature in the list for the ICC Test Cricketer of the Year award were Root, Brook and Sri Lanka's Kamindu Mendis.
Bumrah has been the best bowler in Test cricket in 2024 with 71 wickets from 13 matches at an average of 14.92 and a strike rate of 30.16, the best figures for any bowler.
The right-arm pacer has also been the top bowler in the Border-Gavaskar Trophy with 30 wickets in a mere four Tests.
"Having recovered from a recurring back injury that forced him out of action in 2023, Bumrah went on to rule the bowling roost in 2024. Playing in all 13 Tests of the year, Bumrah put up his career-best yearly haul — 71 wickets — ending the year with more Test wickets than any of his peers," said the ICC in a release on its website.
"Be it the pace-conducive conditions in South Africa and Australia, or tougher conditions for quicks at home, Bumrah was equally impressive through the year. However, it was on India's tour of Australia that the pace spearhead produced his magnum opus," it added.
The ICC graded his Perth match-winning spells to lead India to a 295-run win as some of the most spectacular performances that Bumrah has produced besides his all-conquering display at the T20 World Cup.
"Bumrah claimed 15 wickets in eight games, including two in the final against South Africa, as India went through the 2024 T20 World Cup unbeaten," said the ICC.
Head was nominated after finishing as the leading run-scorer of the T20 World Cup and being at the forefront of Australian batting in Tests.
"Typifying an aggressive brand of batting, the southpaw brandished runs at a brisk rate in the shortest format, and finished among the leading run-getters at ICC Men's T20 World Cup 2024. In the Test arena, Head was vital to Australia's push for defending their ICC World Test Championship title," the ICC said.
England mainstay Root has been the most dominant batter in the year, amassing 1,556 runs from 17 Tests at 55.57. The 34-year-old crossed the 1,000-run mark in a calendar year for the fifth time in his career while scoring six tons and five fifties.
The game's global governing body said, "Across 17 Tests, Joe Root compiled his second-best annual run-tally in Tests — second only to his 1,708 runs from 2021. It was also the fifth instance of Root scoring over 1,000 Test runs in a calendar year."
With six Test hundreds to go alongside five half-centuries, Root was a consistent performer for England, both home and away. His impressive run with the bat saw Root amass joint-fifth highest tons in Tests 36 and alongside Rahul Dravid it added.
The ICC recalled Root's career-best 262 against Pakistan at Multan, also his sixth double century in Tests, and termed it one of his best efforts.
Brook, his compatriot, is also in the list of four shortlisted players after scoring 1,100 runs from 12 Tests at 55.00 with four centuries and three fifties.
Brook is fourth in the list of highest run-scorers in 2024 behind table-topper Root, India's Yashasvi Jaiswal (1,478 runs at 54.74) and England's Ben Duckett (1,149 runs at 37.06).
"A flagbearer of England's quickfire brand of batting, Harry Brook emerged as a breakthrough performer in the longest format," the ICC said.
"A marked feature of his innings was that most of his runs (723) came away from home while he played the same number of games as he did in England (6)," it added.
Brook's "blistering" 317 off 322 deliveries was one of the top performances of the year.
Sri Lanka's Mendis, who hit 1,049 runs from nine Tests at 74.92, is also in the list after enjoying a terrific year, during which he became the joint-third quickest to score 1000 Test runs, equalling Sir Don Bradman's 13-innings mark to reach the milestone.
"Mendis averaged more than any of the batters who played more than two Tests in the calendar year — a staggering 74.92 from nine matches," the apex body said.
"His batting efforts pushed Sri Lanka's case to become the first from the country to reach the ICC World Test Championship Final as the team emerged victorious over New Zealand, England and Bangladesh," the ICC said.
According to the ICC, the twin hundreds by Mendis against New Zealand at home, where he became the fifth-highest run-getter of the year, was described as his most "memorable performance".
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