Mahendra Singh Dhoni, who made the biggest impact on the shorter version as a batsman during the period of evaluation (August 1,2005 to August 8, 2006), including bagging the top spot in the ICC rankings once and hitting the best ever score by a wicketkeeper, has not been nominated for any of the 10 categories, especially among the 17 names for the best ODI player.

The nominations were released today and the annual ICC awards ceremony will be held at Centre of Performing Arts, Mumbai, on October 23.

ICC CEO Malcolm Speed, who released the list, placed the onus on the selectors’ “knowledge, skill and judgment” and added that the “long list will be voted upon by the ICC voting academy, that includes the ten Test skippers, the umpires and match referee panel, legends of the game and select members of media. The pruned list for the awards, will be declared on October 14 at Jaipur.”

At least on two counts, Dhoni should have made the cut. Going by the numbers, Dhoni deserved a place (see box). And if match situation was the criteria, it’s no secret that the 25-year-old has bailed out India on a number of occasions over the last season. In fact, Dhoni has been the key in India morphing into world record chasers last season.

To begin with, he played a crucial role in india winning three ODIs in that famous 6-1 sweep against Sri Lanka last year:

• In Jaipur, he hit a hurricane unbeaten 183 and India won by four wickets, chasing 298.

• In Pune, his unbeaten 45 took India home by six wickets, chasing 261.

• In Baroda (IPCL), Dhoni smashed 80 in India’s five-wicket win, chasing 244.

Then, in the ODI series against Pakistan, India again turned to him to hunt down and win two matches:

• In Lahore, Dhoni’s unbeaten 72 saw India through by five wickets, chasing 288

• And in Karachi, his unconquered 77 saw India thrash Inzamam’s team by eight wickets.

Of course, the rules (not more than 10 ODIs) had already ruled him out of Emerging player of the year list.

However, the good news for India is that skipper Rahul Dravid has been nominated in four categories including captain of the year, cricketer of the year, and Test and ODI player of the year. And Irfan Pathan, who went through a slump in the West Indies remains top one-day wicket-taker of the year and finds a place in the ODI list with the maximum number of wickets in the evaluation period: 58.

This year’s awards also includes two new categories—the women cricketer of the year award, following the ICC’s merger with the International Women Cricket Association earlier this year, and the captain of the year award. The two newly constituted awards takes the total number of categories to 10—seven individual awards and three team awards.

The list of nominees

Test player: Michael Hussey (Aus), Ricky Ponting (Aus), Mohammed Yousuf (Pak), Andrew Flintoff (Eng), Shane Warne (Aus), Muttiah Muralitharan (SL), Kumar Sangakkara (Sri), Rahul Dravid (Ind), Mahela Jayawardene (SL), Kevin Pietersen (Eng), Younis Khan (Pak), Matthew Hayden (Aus) and Makhaya Ntini (RSA).

ODI player: Yuvraj Singh (Ind), Michael Hussey (Aus), Ricky Ponting (Aus), Shane Bond (NZ), Irfan Pathan (Ind), Andrew Flintoff (Eng), Mahela Jayawardene (SL), Muttiah Muralitharan (SL), Rahul Dravid (Ind), Kevin Pietersen (Eng), Mohammed Yousuf (Pak), Herschelle Gibbs (RSA), Brett Lee (Aus), Shahid Afridi (Pak), Inzamam-ul Haq (Pak), Adam Gilchrist (Aus) and Kumar Sangakkara (SL).

Emerging player: Monty Panesar (Eng), Alastair Cook (Eng), Denesh Ramdin (WI), Malinga Bandara (SL), Mohammed Asif (Pak), Upul Tharanga (SL), Ian Bell (Eng) and Shahriar Nafees (Ban).

Captain: Michael Vaughan (Eng), Rahul Dravid (Ind), Ricky Ponting (Aus) and Mahela Jayawardene (SL).

Umpire: Simon Taufel (Aus), Aleem Dar (Pak) and Rudi Koertzen (RSA).

Woman cricketer: Karen Rolton (Aus), Cathryn Fitzpatrick (Aus), Anjum Chopra (Ind), Neetu David (Ind), Claire Taylor (Eng), Katherine Brunt (Eng) and Emily Drumm (NZ).