Top 5 players with most Man of the match awards in Test cricket

In any team sport, collective efforts of all the personnel involved are of paramount significance for being successful. But that does not mean that a team's success depends solely on the cumulative efforts of the teammates.Over the course of the evolution of sports, we have seen many brilliant individual performances from elite players who almost single-handedly won the games for their team. Every sports team generally has at least one elite player who brings the X-factor along with him.For instance in football - players like Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi have been world class performers for whichever teams they have represented over the last decade and a half.Test cricket is supposed to be the measuring medium which is used to analyze the skill set and temperament of any cricketer over the period of five days. In Test cricket - players like Sachin Tendulkar, Ricky Ponting, Kumar Sangakkara, Wasim Akram, and Jacques Kallis have enthralled cricket enthusiasts around the globe through their astonishing individual accomplishments.There have been many cricketers who have displayed excellent levels of consistency in Test cricket and earned laurels for themselves and the nation's they have represented. This slideshow mainly features cricketers who managed to pile up magnificent match-winning performances consistently over the years in the Test format of the game.Here are top five cricketers who have won the most number of Man of the Match awards in Test cricket since its inception.Before entering the list, let us take a look at five players who narrowly missed out from this list-Ricky Ponting - 16Sachin Tendulkar - 14Curtly Ambrose - 14Steve Waugh - 14Mahela Jayawardene - 13#5 Kumar Sangakkara (Sri Lanka) - 16Kumar SangakkaraLegendary Sri Lankan batsman, Kumar Sangakkara has had a highly successful international career spanning over 15 years. He made his test match debut in the year 2000 against South Africa team and has been a persistent run accumulator for the island nation ever since.He formed a lethal alliance with his former teammate and close friend, Mahela Jayawardene during his playing days and tormented the opposition bowling lineups by scoring runs relentlessly for the better part of the last decade.The duo once put on a superlative partnership of 624 runs (in 2006) against the South African lineup which had the likes of Dale Steyn, Makhaya Ntini, Andrew Nel in their bowling ranks.Kumar Sangakkara has won the Man of the Match award on 16 occasions during his storied Test cricket career. He is arguably Sri Lanka's second-biggest match-winner in Test cricket just behind the spin magician - Muttiah Muralitharan.

Top 5 players with most Man of the match awards in Test cricket

#3 Wasim Akram (Pakistan) - 17