D’Arcy’s honour, but a win would be better

HE is the highest ever run-scorer in the Big Bash League, made his T20 debut for Australia on Saturday night and yesterday top-scored for the Hobart Hurricanes in their losing BBL final against the Strikers at Adelaide Oval.

And after the match D’Arcy Short was presented with the BBL07 Player of the Series Award. What more could you ask? “It’s definitely a dream to play Test cricket, that’s for sure,” Short said.

Hurricanes captain George Bailey believes he can.

“I’m just going one step at a time,” Short said. “I’ll play this Aussie T20 series and aspire to play Test cricket and go from there.”

It was a bitter-sweet moment to accept the player of the season award after losing the final by 25 runs.

“I’m happy to be player of the tournament but I would have liked to have finished it off today with a win,” Short said. “I’m disappointed.”

Short finished the regular season as leading run-scorer, having blasted 504 runs in 10 matches, including a record-breaking unbeaten 122 against the Brisbane Heat — his innings setting a new benchmark for the highest BBL top score, coming off just 69 balls.

Short’s remarkable season helped steer the Hurricanes to a finals berth and saw him finish eight votes clear of the Sydney Thunder’s Shane Watson (18 votes) and 10 votes ahead of Adelaide Striker’s keeperbatsman Alex Carey (16 votes).

“We will regroup and see where we can get better and try to go one step further next year,” Short said.

“We were definitely close this year but just couldn’t get over the line.”