There is no denying the fact that appreciation and awards motivate a person to perform well in the future as well and for this purpose, the Player of the Match (POTM) award is given to a cricketer who not only plays well but also helps his team in winning a match. It rarely happens in a cricket match that the player from the losing side gets the POTM award so in simple words, we can say that a player who plays a vital role in his team’s win is chosen for this award out of 22 players of both the sides.
While in test cricket, the record for winning the maximum number of the POTM awards is in the name of former South African cricketer Jacques Kallis as he has won it 23 times in 166 test matches, in ODIs, former Indian cricketer Sachin Tendulkar holds this record with 62 awards in 463 matches. If we talk about the shortest format, Virat Kohli is at the top of the list with 15 POTM awards in 115 matches but there is one Indian cricketer who may leave Virat Kohli behind if that cricketer keeps on playing in the same manner as he is playing in the present times.
The name of that Indian cricketer is Suryakumar Yadav and he has already broken one record of Virat Kohli related to the Player of the Series award.
SKY is in sublime form of his life, he has scored a century in the third and the last T20I match of the series against Sri Lanka and many fans believed that he should have been included in the Indian squad which will play ODIs against Sri Lanka too. However, Suryakumar Yadav was not included in the squad as skipper Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli and KL Rahul made a comeback in the team.
The good thing is that Suryakumar Yadav is performing well in the T20Is and hopefully, he won’t be dropped from India’s T20I squad, though you can’t say anything with confidence about the current Indian team management.
The record:
Suryakumar Yadav:
In the 3rd and the last T20I against Sri Lanka, SKY played an instrumental role in India’s win and he was awarded with the POTM award, this was his 10th POTM award in 45 T20I matches and with this, he broke the record of Virat Kohli of winning 10 POTM awards in 50 or less than 50 T20Is.
Suryakumar Yadav made his international debut in the year 2021 and till date, he has played 16 ODIs and 45 T20Is in which he has scored 384 runs (2 fifties) and 1578 runs (13 fifties & 3 centuries), respectively.
Virat Kohli:
Earlier, the record of winning 10 POTM awards in 20Is in 50 T20I matches (very few matches) was in the name of Virat Kohli but now it has been broken by Suryakumar Yadav. However, the record of winning the maximum number of POTM awards in T20Is is still in the name of Virat as he has won 15 POTM awards in 115 matches.
SKY can easily break this record, what do you say?
