And the winner is….Bharat Popli!
New Zealand Cricket’s Domestic Player of the Year award for 2015/16 has been claimed by a 25-year-old middle order rock who became just the fifth batsman to score 1000 runs in a Plunket Shield season — in just his third year of first-class cricket.
PHOTOSPORT
A fluid shotmaker and calm, dependable presence for the SKYCITY Northern Knights this summer, it’s the first time the right-hander has received the distinction, in a breakthrough season that netted him 1149 runs in all, from 10 games at 65.78.
That included three centuries and a top score of 172 against the Devon Hotel Central Stags, and on three other occasions he was dismissed in the nineties.
Popli’s eventual season tally carried him past Michael Papps and then Jeff Crowe, while a stellar duo in former England international Graeme Hick (1228 at 94.46, also for Northern) and the late Martin Crowe (1348 at 103.69 for Central in 1986/87) are the only players to have had more productive Plunket Shield campaigns.
Popli scored his maiden first-class century on Eden Park’s Outer Oval before Christmas, against eventual champions the Mondiale Auckland Aces, and just kept going, as if the floodgates had been opened.
He followed it up with 133 against the Stags in Napier, before adding his pièce de resistance against the same opposition at Hamilton.
Born in New Delhi, India, Popli grew up in New Zealand, where he played alongside Kane Williamson for Tauranga Boys’ College and Bay of Plenty Cricket.
Bharat Popli receiving his awards from NZC's Anthony Crummy last night
He is one of the few players on the New Zealand scene to be making a name for himself solely with the red ball and was presented with his NZC Domestic Player of the Year award in Hamilton on Thursday night, after having claimed the trophies for Northern Districts men's Cricketer of the Year and Batsman of the Year earlier in the evening.
New Zealand Cricket congratulates Bharat Popli on his distinction after a wonderful season.
