Mohammad Rizwan named Wisden’s Leading T20 Cricketer in the World in 2021

By
Faizan Lakhani
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Pakistans Mohammad Rizwan plays a shot during the Twenty20 international cricket match between Pakistan and Australia at the Gaddafi Cricket Stadium in Lahore on April 5, 2022. -AFP
Pakistan's Mohammad Rizwan plays a shot during the Twenty20 international cricket match between Pakistan and Australia at the Gaddafi Cricket Stadium in Lahore on April 5, 2022. -AFP  

KARACHI: Pakistan’s wicketkeeper-batter Mohammad Rizwan has been named the Leading T20 Cricketer in the World in the 2022 edition of the Wisden Almanack.

Rizwan, last year, became the first-ever cricketer in the history of T20 cricket to amass over 2,000 runs in a calendar year. He scored 2,036 runs in 45 innings at an average of 56.55 in 2021. 

Read more: Rizwan sets eyes on improving record in 2022

He also became the first-ever player to score 1,000 T20 international runs in a calendar year. His 2021 runs tally includes 1,326 runs at an average of 73.66 in international cricket.

It is worth mentioning that Rizwan in the previous year was named among Widen Cricketers of the year as well.

While profiling Rizwan for Wisden, Alan Gardner wrote that Rizwan was batting as if blessed with foresight and recalled the video that went viral after Pakistan’s win in ICC T20 World Cup against India.

Read more: Former cricketer suggests replacing Babar Azam with Mohammad Rizwan as T20I captain

“Twenty20 batting is supposed to be a volatile, high-variance occupation: boom-boom or bust. Occasionally, a player produces a purple patch to rise above the hurly-burly. But no one has had a year of such sustained run-scoring as Pakistan’s Mohammad Rizwan.

“Never mind seeing it well: he was batting as if blessed with foresight. And in a sense he was. After starring in Pakistan’s ten-wicket demolition of India at the T20 World Cup, his clarity of purpose was summed up by a viral video from the ICC that spliced his pre-game routine of visualisation alongside the boundaries he struck during his 55-ball 79,” he wrote.

He also highlighted how remarkable the year was for Mohammad Rizwan.

Read more: Mohammad Rizwan becomes 2nd Pakistani wicket-keeper to hit century in 4th innings

“In all T20 cricket, he made 2,036 at 56. No one — not Chris Gayle, not Virat Kohli, not Rizwan’s opening partner, Babar Azam, who last year scored 1,779 himself — had ever got near 2,000,” Alan Gardner noted.