Indian batsman Virender Sehwag has won the ICC Test Player of the Year at the LG ICC Awards ceremony in Bengaluru.
Sehwag beat off short-list competition from team-mate Sachin Tendulkar and the South African duo of Dale Steyn and Hashim Amla to claim the first ICC award of his career.
During the 12-month voting period, Sehwag put in some remarkable performances with the bat, making 1,282 runs with an impressive average of 85.46 in the 10 Test matches he played. He scored six centuries and four half-centuries during the period.
Upon collecting the award from former West Indies bowler Courtney Walsh the 31-year-old Sehwag said: Upon collecting the award from former West Indies bowler Courtney Walsh the 31-year-old Sehwag said: ?It?s fantastic to win the award to take over the title from Gautam Gambhir.
?I try to play the best I can in Test match cricket and play the same way I do in every format of the game.
?I?m a huge fan of Test cricket and I love to play it more than Twenty20 or one-day cricket and the game is something I love to play.?
For all the individual awards (with the exceptions of the Women?s Cricketer of the Year and the Umpire of the Year), a long-list compiled by an independent selection panel was forwarded to the 25-person voting academy made up of former players, respected members of the media, an elite umpire and an elite match referee. They voted on a three, two, one basis (with three being the highest value) and the winners emerged.
The panel was chaired by West Indies legend Clive Lloyd and included former Australia batsman Matthew Hayden, former England bowler Angus Fraser, former Zimbabwe player and England coach Duncan Fletcher and former India all-rounder Ravi Shastri.