ICC Awards of the Decade: 5 categories for which Virat Kohli has been nominated

The decade is coming to a close, and the International Cricket Council (ICC) released the nominations for the silverware to be awarded to various cricketers for their performances on Tuesday (November 24).

The ‘Fab 4’ of Virat Kohli, Steve Smith, Joe Root and Kane Williamson have undoubtedly stood out throughout the decade. But if we were to pick any one of the four players to sweep the awards of the decade, it would be none other than Virat Kohli.

Not only has the current Indian captain racked up a mountain of runs and strung together a garland of centuries, but he has done so in all three formats. Virat Kohli has been nominated in 5 categories in the ICC Awards of the Decade – Player, ODI Player, Test Player, T20I Player and Spirit of Cricket.

Virat Kohli smashed his maiden ODI hundred on December 24, 2009 against Sri Lanka at the Eden Gardens. Its 11th anniversary is around the corner, and the Indian skipper has added 42 more ODI tons in his kitty. Since crossing 1000 runs in a calendar year for the first time in 2011, Kohli has aggregated 10,388 runs in just 202 ODI innings between 2011 and 2020.

Virat Kohli’s first Test hundred came a bit late when he smashed 116 in a losing cause against Australia at the Adelaide Oval in January 2012. Nonetheless, he still has a memorable decade to remember in the longest format, right from his Test debut in Jamaica on June 20, 2011.

In 145 Test innings, Virat Kohli has scored 7,240 runs at an impressive average of 53.63 – including 27 hundreds and 22 half-centuries. The 32-year-old played just one T20I innings before 2011, and he is already the leading run-getter – 2,794 runs at an average and strike-rate of 50.80 and 138.25 respectively – in the format in international cricket.

Apart from troubling scorers all over the world, Virat Kohli has also upheld the spirit of the game. If people thought him and Steve Smith to be rivals – especially after the latter’s ‘brainfade’ moment in Bengaluru – the Indian skipper put all those speculations to bed by asking the English crowd not to boo Smith at the World Cup last year.

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Players Virat Kohli would be competing with at the ICC awards this year

We now take a look at the various players Virat Kohli would be competing with in a bid to bag those five ICC awards.

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ICC Men’s Player of the Decade

Nominees: Virat Kohli (India), Joe Root (England), Kane Williamson (New Zealand), AB de Villiers (South Africa), Steve Smith (Australia), Ravichandran Ashwin (India), Kumar Sangakkara (Sri Lanka)

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ICC Men’s Test Player of the Decade

Nominees: Virat Kohli (India), Joe Root (England), Steve Smith (Australia), James Anderson (England), Kane Williamson (New Zealand), Rangana Herath (Sri Lanka), Yasir Shah (Pakistan)

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ICC Men’s ODI Player of the Decade

Nominees: Virat Kohli (India), Lasith Malinga (Sri Lanka), Mitchell Starc (Australia), AB de Villiers (South Africa), Rohit Sharma (India), MS Dhoni (India), Kumar Sangakkara (Sri Lanka)

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ICC Men’s T20I Player of the Decade

Nominees: Rashid Khan (Afghanistan), Virat Kohli (India), Rohit Sharma (India), Imran Tahir (South Africa), Aaron Finch (Australia), Lasith Malinga (Sri Lanka), Chris Gayle (West Indies)

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ICC Spirit of Cricket Award of the Decade

Nominees: Virat Kohli (India), Kane Williamson (New Zealand), Anya Shrubsole (England), Misbah-ul-Haq (Pakistan), Brendon McCullum (New Zealand), Katherine Brunt (England), Mahela Jayawardene (Sri Lanka), Daniel Vettori (New Zealand), MS Dhoni (India)