SA stars honoured in cricket annual
Aiden Markram and Lungi Ngidi, two of SA’s most exciting young talents, are among the five Cricketers of the Year named in the 2018 South African Cricket Annual.
Markram scored 1,000 runs at an average of 55.55 in his first season of Test cricket, while fast bowler Ngidi made a sensational start to his Test career by taking six for 39 on debut against India at Centurion.
Unlike the official Cricket South Africa awards, a player can only be honoured once as a South African Cricket Annual Cricketer of the Year.
The other three players named in the annual are Titans fast bowler Junior Dala, Warriors captain and allrounder Jon-Jon Smuts and Lions batsman Rassie van der Dussen.
The South African Cricket Annual, edited by veteran journalist Colin Bryden, is widely regarded as one of the best publications of its type, a local equivalent of England’s famed Wisden Cricketers’ Almanack.
The 2018 edition consists of 680 pages, packed with feature articles, reports, photographs, scores and statistics.
It covers one of the most eventful periods in SA’s cricketing history, with a home season which featured 10 Test matches, including series wins against India and Australia.
All SA’s men’s and women’s international matches, up to the tour of Sri Lanka in August, are covered in detail.
Feature articles include an examination of the state of pitches in SA and a full account of the controversies in the series against Australia.
There are also tributes to AB de Villiers and Morne Morkel to mark their retirement from international cricket.
Dedicated cricket followers will be particularly fascinated by the detailed statistical sections, compiled by Andrew Samson, CSA’s world-renowned official statistician.
A comprehensive obituaries section recalls personalities who died during the past year, including Test stars Colin Bland and Clive van Ryneveld and allrounder Sulaiman “Dik” Abed, who became a legend in England’s Lancashire League.
The South African Cricket Annual will be available at selected bookstores or specialist publishers’ representatives Blue Weaver – info@blueweaver.co.za – at a recommended retail price of R250.