DUBAI (AP) — England batter Joe Root and India pacer Jasprit Bumrah are among the four players in contention for the International Cricket Council’s men’s player of the year award.

Prolific England batter Harry Brook and Australia’s Travis Head are the other two men’s nominees announced by the ICC on Monday.

Bumrah has been superb with his seam bowling this year and produced another near unplayable spell when he took 5-57 in the fourth test against Australia, which finished Monday with a dramatic victory for the Australians.

It was his 13th five-wicket haul in tests and the 31-year-old now has 203 test wickets at an average of 19.42. He took 71 wickets in 13 tests this year, averaging a remarkably low 14.92. He also captured 15 wickets as India won their second men’s T20 World Cup title.

Root has enjoyed a brilliant year with the bat, scoring 1,556 runs from 17 tests with an average of 55.57.

It was the fifth time he has scored 1,000 test runs in a calendar year and his six hundreds — including a career-best score of 262 — took him to 36 test tons and joint fifth place all-time with India’s Rahul Dravid.

He also surpassed Alastair Cook to become England’s leading run-scorer with 12,972.

Brook compiled 1,100 runs from 12 tests at a strike rate of 85.00, showcasing both his brutal hitting and ability to improvise under pressure with some exquisite timing.

He hit four hundreds, including a superb triple century with a blistering 317 off 322 deliveries against Pakistan on an admittedly pancake-flat track in Multan — where Root made his 262 during their marathon 453-run stand.

Head, meanwhile, has stood out with his aggressive counter-attacking batting in both tests and T20s.

South Africa batter Laura Wolvaardt and Sri Lanka’s all-formats captain Chamari Athapaththu are the women’s nominees along with allrounders Annabel Sutherland (Australia) and Melie Kerr (New Zealand).

Wolvaardt scored 697 runs across 12 ODIs, averaging 87.12 with a highest score of 184 not out. She complied 223 runs across three tests, averaging 37.16 with a best knock of 122.

Athapaththu hit 458 runs across nine ODIs, averaging 65.42 with a top score of195. In T20s she scored 720 runs and took 21 wickets, with best figures of 4-29. ___

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