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| Ponting named Australian Cricketer of the Year | | | Captain Ricky Ponting was named Australia's cricketer of the year on Monday, winning the Allan Border Medal for the third time in four years.
Ponting completed a unique clean sweep when he was also named Australian Test and one-day player of the year.
"To win all three awards tonight has blown me away," he said. "It's been the best cricketing year of my life. "I knew I'd had a good Test year, I thought my one-day season had been very up and down, but if you get enough man of the match awards I guess you're going to poll a few votes.
"It's a great honor to win an Allan Border Medal, but to win three is pretty special."
Ponting, who received the Allan Border medal in 2004 and 2006, became the first to earn the award three times and the first to win all three awards in the same season.
He secured 107 of the votes awarded by players, media and umpires for individual performances in each of the 10 tests and 28 one-day internationals Australia played in the last year. Runner-up Mike Hussey polled 58 votes, and retiring spinner Shane Warne 56.
Ponting led Australia to victories in all 10 Tests it played in the voting period, and to wins in the Champions Trophy in India, the DLF Cup in Malaysia, and its own limited overs tri-series.
The highlight of his year was Australia's sweep of England in the Ashes Test series, regaining the trophy and making Ponting's side the first since 1920-21 to win a five-match series 5-0.
The Test series finished on an emotional note given the retirements of Warne, Glenn McGrath and Justin Langer - Damien Martyn also signed off during the series. Ponting said he had been looking forward to spending the awards night with his former teammates.
Ponting's century in a one-day tri-series match against New Zealand on Sunday clinched the one-day award ahead of Andrew Symonds, and he won the Test award by two votes from Warne. He scored 2,083 runs in 33 matches across both forms of the game over the past year at 59.51 with nine centuries. |
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