Wisden double for Sangakkara

Sri Lanka batsman Kumar Sangakkara has become the first man to be named simultaneously as Wisden's leading cricketer in the world and one of its five cricketers of the year.

Sangakkara is joined as the five Wisden players of the year by Lancashire's Glen Chapple, Worcestershire's Alan Richardson and England duo Alastair Cook and Tim Bresnan.
Sangakkara compiled 2,267 international runs in the three formats last year - no other player broke 2,000 - with five centuries and 13 fifties, and uniquely reached four figures in both Tests and one-day internationals for the third time.

A century in probably his last Test on English soil at Hampshire helped ensure he was named as one of the cricketers of the year, the award conferred by the publication's editor - a mantle taken on this year by Lawrence Booth - on the individuals who have most shaped the English cricketing summer, and which a player can win only once.

"I had always wanted a Test hundred at Lord's but, if that was not to be, then anywhere in England," Sangakkara tells David Hopps in the Almanack. "The Rose Bowl felt as if it might be my last opportunity." (skysports.com)