De Kock, Laura Wolvaardt bag top honours at CSA awards

Wicketkeeper-batsman Quinton de Kock was named South Africa Men’s Cricketer of the Year and Test Cricketer of the Year at the virtual Cricket South Africa awards ceremony held on Saturday (July 4). Women’s cricketer Laura Woolvardt also bagged a couple of awards – South Africa Women’s Cricketer of the Year and ODI Cricketer of the Year.

This is the second time that de Kock has bagged the South African cricketer of the year award. He joins an illustrious list of players like Makhaya Ntini, Kagiso Rabada, Hashim Amla, AB de Villiers and Jacques Kallis as only the sixth player to win the award twice in his career.

“Quinny and Laura have set the highest standards that we expect from our icon Proteas players,” said CSA’s acting chief executive Dr. Jacques Faul.

“Quinny is the leading wicketkeeper/batsman in Test cricket and is, in fact, one of the leading batsmen in both red-ball and white-ball cricket. He is also starting to emerge as an outstanding leader as witnessed by the Proteas clean sweep of Australia in their recent ODI series,” he added.

Ngidi, Nortje also win

The ODI and T20I Cricketer of the Year awards went to pace spearhead Lungi Ngidi. The Men’s Newcomer of the Year award was won by rising sensation Anrich Nortje, who impressed with a five-wicket haul in the Tests against England.

“Laura was named in the tournament select XI at the conclusion of the ICC Women’s World T20 which tells us a great deal about the esteem in which she is held at international level. At the age of 21 her best years are ahead of her and she will be a key player when the Momentum Proteas go to the ICC Women’s World Cup next year,” he further said.

In Women’s Cricket, Shabnim Ismail won the T20I Cricketer of the Year award, whereas left-arm spinner Nonkululeko Mlaba bagged the Women’s Newcomer of the Year award.