ESPNcricinfo Awards 2009: Sehwag, Dilshan, Johnson take Statsguru prizes
The players of 2009, as decided by the numbers, in the list of Statsguru Awards winners

Johnson: Best Test Bowler, runner-up in the Bowler of the Year stakes, and best Test strike rate • Robert Prezioso/Getty Images
Main awards
(cut-off: 700 runs each in Tests and ODIs)
(cut-off: 30 wickets each in Tests and ODIs)
(cut-off: 700 runs)
Gambhir played only five Tests, but scored 727 runs at an average of 90.87. He struck four hundreds, the joint second-highest for the year - only Dilshan, with six, had more. Rahul Dravid averaged 83 with seven 50-plus scores in six Tests, while Thilan Samaraweera, the highest run-getter for the year with 1234, averaged 72.58.
(cut-off: 700 runs)
He missed out on several Test centuries in 2009, but that also meant Watson consistently scored half-centuries - he had six of them in 12 innings. He average for the year was an excellent 65.09, and the fact that he did it with just one century gave him a very low standard deviation - which measures the average distance from the mean - of 32.50. Combined with his average, it gave him a consistency index (average divided by standard deviation) of 2.00.
(cut-off: 30 wickets)
The bowler who took the most wickets in 2009 also took them at the best average. Johnson picked up 63 in 13 Tests at 27.42, marginally ahead of Graeme Swann, who averaged 27.92 for his 54 scalps. A bigger surprise was a legendary spinner who didn't even make the 30-wicket cut: Muttiah Muralitharan picked up 26 wickets in eight Tests, with each one costing him 45.96.
(cut-off: 700 runs against all Test-playing teams excluding Zimbabwe)
His ODI career had been relatively quiet before last year, but in 2009 he absolutely rocked with the bat, averaging 45 at a strike rate of more than 136. Multiplying the average by the average runs per ball gave him a batting factor of 61.46, marginally ahead of MS Dhoni's 60.30 (average 70.47, strike rate 85.57). Dilshan, the only batsman apart from Sehwag with a strike rate of more than 100, came in third with an average of 55.55 and a strike rate of 103.19).
(cut-off: 30 wickets, excluding matches involving Zimbabwe and other non-Test-playing teams)
In 19 matches, Anderson took 34 wickets at an average of 23.61 and an economy rate of 4.97, which gave him an ODI bowling index of 19.56. That put him ahead of Broad, who'd edged past him in the overall bowler ratings. Broad was second here with an index of 21.47 (average 22.84, economy rate 5.64), while Australia's Nathan Hauritz finished third with an index of 21.53 (average 29.76, economy rate 4.34).
****
Other awards
(Cut-off: 700 runs, unless mentioned otherwise)
(Cut-off: eight innings)
Neither is a specialist opener, but Katich and Watson did the job better than anyone else in 2009. On the 12 occasions when they opened the innings, they averaged 71.33 per partnership, with six 50-plus partnerships. They pipped the Indian pair of Gambhir and Sehwag, who averaged 66.25 in eight innings. At the bottom of the pile was the New Zealand pair of Martin Guptill and Tim McIntosh, who batted together 12 times but averaged a meagre 15.75.
(Cut-off: eight innings)
Jayawardene batted with Samaraweera in eight Test innings in 2009, and scored exactly 1000 runs at an average of 142.85. Their stands included a mammoth one of 437 for the fourth wicket against Pakistan in Karachi, which is a record for that wicket. Their list of partnerships read as follows: 437, 11*, 19, 166, 180, 39, 138, 10. They were so far ahead of the field that the second-best pair, Australia's Marcus North and Brad Haddin, averaged half that number: 71.62, in eight partnerships. The most incompatible pair of the year was also from Australia - Michael Clarke and Michael Hussey averaged 27.35 in 14 innings.
This one's an unlikely winner - Taylor scored 782 runs in 2009, which is 18.19% of New Zealand's total runs scored in the year. The leading run-scorer of the year, Samaraweera, scored 17.22% of Sri Lanka's total runs as Sri Lanka had several high-scoring batsmen in 2009 - of the top six leading run-getters, four were Sri Lankans.
(cut-off: 400 runs in wins)
Dilshan scored 652 runs in the Tests that Sri Lanka won in 2009, at an exceptional average of 81.50. Katich, Samaraweera and Clarke were the only others who scored more than 500 runs in wins.
Sehwag had a strike rate of 108.98, but he failed to make the 700-run cut, scoring only 631 runs, thanks to the few Tests India played in the year. Dilshan averaged more than 64 in the 11 Tests he played, but more impressively, scored at a strike rate of 82.66. Next was England's Matt Prior, with a strike rate of 72.69, while Chris Gayle scored at 67.73 per 100 balls.
Taylor struck nine sixes and 106 fours in the 782 runs he scored, a percentage of 61.13. Gayle was next at 59% (18 sixes and 82 fours in 739), while Watson had a percentage of 57.26. At the bottom of the pile was Paul Collingwood, with a percentage of just 39.78 (88 fours and two sixes in a tally of 915).
(cut-off: 30 wickets)
Johnson was the clear leader here, with a wicket every 47.8 deliveries, which gave him his second Statsguru Award of 2009. In second place was Broad, with a strike rate of 53.8, while Graeme Swann was third with 57.5.
(cut-off: 15 wickets)
For the second year running Harbhajan took this award, taking 15 fourth-innings wickets at an average of 20. Herath was next, with 21 wickets at 24.14, while Johnson's 28 wickets came at 26.10.
(Cut-off: 700 runs, unless mentioned otherwise)
In the 593 balls he faced in ODIs in 2009, Sehwag scored 810 runs, giving him a strike rate of 136.59 runs per 100 balls, easily the highest of the year. Dilshan was the only other batsman with a strike rate of more than 100, scoring at 103.19 in his 19 innings for a tally of exactly 1000 runs from 969 balls.
Clarke has an overall ODI strike rate of more than 77, but in 2009 it dropped to 69.77, as he scored 852 runs in 1221 balls. In 22 innings he struck just one six. He was also the only one, among the 15 batsmen who scored more than 700 runs, with a strike rate of less than 80. Brendon McCullum, who was the next lowest, had a strike rate of 80.21.
(cut-off: at least eight innings)
In 11 innings this New Zealand pair put together 519 runs at an average of 47.18 and a scoring rate of 6.15 runs per over, giving them a partnership index score (average stand multiplied by runs per ball) of 48.36. India's Sehwag and Tendulkar were next, with an index score of 44.22 (average 40.20 at a scoring rate of 6.60 runs per over).
(cut-off: at least eight innings)
Sehwag struck 114 fours and 20 sixes in ODIs in 2009, thus scoring 576 out of 810 runs in boundaries. That translates into a percentage of 71.11, easily the highest of the batsmen who scored 700 or more runs in the year. Yuvraj Singh is next with 61.08% runs in boundaries, while Dhoni is the least of the lot, with an incredibly low percentage of 35.39: of the 1198 runs he scored, only 424 came in fours (79) and sixes (18).
Hussey pips de AB de Villiers in this one by the narrowest of margins: Hussey had a dot-ball percentage of 42.37, while de Villiers was marginally behind at 42.95. Gambhir and Sehwag did very well too on this count, especially considering the fact that openers generally play more dot-balls due to close-set fields. Sehwag had a dot-ball percentage of 43.17, while for Gambhir it was 44.98. The highest dot-ball percentage belonged to McCullum (57.80%), who edged out Clarke (57%).
South Africa scored 3883 ODI runs, of which de Villiers' contribution was 706, a percentage of 18.18. He scored those runs at an average of 58.83 and a strike rate of 93.01. Next in line was Dhoni, who scored 16.52% of India's total runs.
(cut-off: 400 runs)
de Villiers wins this one too, with 538 runs in ODI wins out of South Africa's 2362 in these matches, with a percentage of 22.78. de Villiers performed exceptionally in wins, averaging 107.60 at a strike rate of 102.67 in eight matches. McCullum is next, with a percentage of 20.01.
(cut-off: 150 overs)
Pakistan's Ajmal bowled 152.1 overs and conceded only 604 runs, an economy rate of 3.96. He was the only bowler who bowled more than 150 overs and had an economy rate of less than four. Daniel Vettori was exceptional too, with an economy rate of 4.06.
In 153.5 overs, Ishant Sharma leaked 969 runs, an economy rate of 6.29. He was the only bowler to concede more than a run per ball. Ashish Nehra was close, with an economy rate of 5.92.
Sri Lanka's Kulasekara won this one with a dot-ball percentage of 62.01, with Anderson next at 59.34 and Vettori third at 57.64.
Ajmal wins this one too, conceding only 33 fours and five sixes in 913 deliveries, a percentage of 4.16. Nathan Hauritz is next at 5.01, with Afridi third with a percentage of 5.22.
India played only six Tests in 2009, but won three of those convincingly - two by an innings and one by 10 wickets - which gave them the highest differential between their batting and bowling averages: their batting average was 20.45 more than their bowling average. Australia were next with a differential of 9.42.
Among teams who played more than five ODIs (excluding games against Zimbabwe and non-Test-playing sides), India had the best win-loss ratio, winning 17 and losing 10. They also had the highest differential between the batting index (average multiplied by run rate) and bowling index (average multiplied by economy rate). The differential for India was 9.01, while South Africa was next with 5.67.
In the 24 ODIs they played in 2009, New Zealand conceded only 203 extras, an average of 8.46 per match, which was the lowest among all teams. India and Bangladesh were next, with 11.4 extras each per match. New Zealand also had the biggest differential between extras gained while batting and extras conceded in the field - they got 341 and conceded 203, a difference of 138.
S Rajesh is stats editor of Cricinfo