Tendulkar wins Cricketer of the Year award

Sachin Tendulkar wins Cricketer of the Year award 2011 :

The first ICC award, the Sir Garfield Sobers Trophy, by being named the Cricketer of the Year during the 2010 ICC Award ceremony in Bangalore. Tendulkar, however, lost out in the other major categories he was nominated in, with Virender Sehwag winning the Test Cricketer of the Year award and AB de Villiers claiming the ODI prize.

“This last season has been really special for the entire team,” Tendulkar, who also received the People’s Choice Award, said. “I think right from the start of the season, when we won in Sri Lanka and I scored a hundred in the finals, and from there on the season took off for us. We became No. 1 in the Test rankings, something we all wanted to achieve, and we’ve been able to maintain our performances in the last ten months.”

Tendulkar said Gary Kirsten, the India coach, had played an important role in the success of all the batsmen. “He has been instrumental in making all the batters play plenty of deliveries in practice sessions, he himself throws thousands of deliveries,” Tendulkar said. “Gary has been able to keep us in the right frame of mind, whatever areas we needed to work on, he is making sure we are addressing that.”

Tendulkar fought off competition from Sehwag, Hashim Amla and Graeme Swann, the other nominees in the Cricketer of the Year category. Previous winners of the Cricketer of the Year award include Rahul Dravid, Andrew Flintoff, Jacques Kallis, Ricky Ponting, Shivnarine Chanderpaul and Mitchell Johnson.