Root, Jones, Brook and Capsey lead PCA award winners

The recipients of the four main awards have been confirmed as the end-of-season prizes start to be distributed

Joe Root, Eve Jones, Harry Brook and Alice Capsey have all been recognised in the four main categories at the annual cinch PCA Awards.

England Test captain Root and Central Sparks and Birmingham Phoenix allrounder Jones have been men and women's player of the year respectively.

Yorkshire and Northern Superchargers batter Brook is the young men's player of the year while 17-year-old Capsey has been named the inaugural winner of the best young female player.

All awards are voted for by the players.

Leading the winners is Root, whose 661 Test runs for England which included three centuries against India saw him beat David Bedingham, Luke Fletcher and Simon Harmer to the prize.

This is the second time the Yorkshireman has been recognised, having won the young player gong in 2012.

“I’ve been in good touch and had a good understanding of how I wanted to score my runs this year," said the 30-year-old. 

"There have been some really close games and it’s been very enjoyable. I’ve scored runs against the best teams in the world so that has given me confidence, even as an experienced player."

Jones meanwhile become the first domestic player to scoop the main women's prize in the first summer following the awarding of 41 full-time contracts by the ECB in December 2020.

The 29-year-old has illuminated each and every competition she has graced, scoring 943 runs and taking eight wickets this summer.

That haul included hitting a competition-best 276 runs in the Charlotte Edwards Cup for Sparks, leading to her being named player of the tournament and PCA Women's Overall Domestic MVP.

Those exploits earned her a Women's Big Bash League contract with Melbourne Renegades.

^{Brook enjoyed a stellar summer against the white ball}

“It’s been a long time coming for a lot of the girls to dedicate more time to playing and training, so I’ve thoroughly enjoyed being a professional throughout the last year," said Jones, who becomes the non-England international recipient. "Having cricket as my main career is something that I’ve dreamed of for a long time."

Following in the footsteps of Chris Silverwood, Matthew Hoggard, Adil Rashid, Adam Lyth, Root and Alex Lees, Brook becomes the latest winner of the men's young player prize to hail from Yorkshire.

The 22-year-old dominated in the white-ball formats in 2021, cracking 486 runs at 69.42 in the T20 Blast before adding another 189 for the Headingley-based Northern Superchargers in the men's Hundred.

He backed up that form in the County Championship, finishing as Yorkshire's second-best run-scorer (797 runs at 37.95) as the club pushed for the title.

“I really look up to the likes of Joe Root," said Brook, who succeeds 2020 winner Zak Crawley. "You can learn so much from such a good player, and you try to take parts of their game and put it into yours. Often I’ll pick the best players from around the world and try to put parts of their game into mine.

^{Capsey claimed two white-ball titles in 2021}

“The best players back it up year after year and hopefully I can do that. There are still things to work on in my game and there’s a big winter coming up where I can try to become better and better.”

Teenager Capsey could hardly have asked for a better year, being part of the Oval Invincibles and South East Stars side who won the women's Hundred and the CE Cup.

Across the four competitions in which she appeared, Capsey smashed 629 runs and claimed 30 wickets via her handy off-breaks.

"It’s a huge honour and it will probably be one of the best awards that I win in my career,2 she admitted. "To be the first person to have your name engraved on the trophy will be really special.

"This year has been the best summer I’ve had, and to experience that with my friends and teammates has been incredible - I’ll remember it for a very long time."

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