Shahid Afridi tops Player of the Tournament table ahead of ICC World Twenty20 final

[Kool Guy]

Pakistan's Shahid Afridi heads the list of contenders for the player of the tournament award at the ICC World Twenty20 South Africa 2007.

The all-rounder has so far polled seven votes to top the latest table, but there are still four players who can catch him as they all come from the sides contesting Monday's final - India and Pakistan.

Those players include three of Afridi's team-mates - Misbah-ul-Haq, Younus Khan and his captain, Shoaib Malik - as well as India's six-hitting star Yuvraj Singh.

All five players have performed strongly during the tournament thus far.

Leg-spinner Afridi is the joint leading wicket-taker - alongside Australia's Stuart Clark - with 12 victims, and has also scored rapidly whenever he has reached the batting crease, making 91 runs from just 45 balls faced.

Malik (187) and Misbah (175) are among the leading run-scorers in the tournament (only Matthew Hayden of Australia, with 265 runs, has more than Malik's total), while Younus's haul of 103 runs includes 51 against Sri Lanka, part of a fourth-wicket record stand of 101 with Malik.

Younus has also taken six catches, a mark only AB De Villiers of South Africa, among all outfielders in the tournament, can match.

As for Yuvraj, his 134 runs have come from just 57 balls, giving him the best batting strike-rate of any player with 75 runs or more - 235.08 runs per hundred balls.

His total includes 12 sixes, seven during his 16-ball innings of 58 against England that included six maximums in one over from Stuart Broad, and another five in his 70 from just 30 deliveries against Australia in the semi-final.

The votes for the player of the tournament award are cast by the commentators for the host broadcaster, ESPN STAR Sports.

They nominate the player of the match for each game on a 3, 2, 1 basis, with three votes for the top performer, two for next best and one vote for the third choice. Those votes are then added together to produce the player of the tournament standings.

All matches, including the final, count towards those standings and the player with most votes at the end of the tournament receives a superb trophy.

If more than one player finishes tied at the top of the list then the player with the most man of the match awards (three votes) is declared the winner.

Yuvraj has two man of the match awards so far (against England and Australia) while Misbah (Australia), Younus (Sri Lanka) and Afridi (Scotland) have one each.