Reece and Bell claim September awards

Derbyshire’s Luis Reece and Thunder’s Oliva Bell have been voted PCA Players of the Month for September following some inspired performances in domestic cricket.

The pair were shortlisted through the PCA’s Most Valuable Player Rankings, powered by Argentex, for their performances in the month of September as the top four players according to the unique algorithm from the men’s and women’s game faced a public vote to decide the winners.

In the men’s category, Reece won an incredible 69% of the vote with Middlesex’s Sam Robson in second on 15%. All-rounder Liam Dawson, who recently picked up LV= Insurance County Championship Player of the Year and PCA Men’s Domestic Overall MVP, finished third with his Hampshire teammate and captain, James Vince, in fourth place. Reece joins, Ollie Price, Paul Walter, Matt Critchley, Matthew Montgomery and Ryan Higgins to complete the Player of the Month list for 2023.

For the women’s award, Bell earned 30% of the vote with Sunrisers all-rounder Grace Scrivens just behind on 26%. Recently crowned Rachael Heyhoe Flint Trophy Player of the Year, Georgia Adams finished in third with teammate Linsey Smith in fourth. Bell joins, Adams, Jodie Grewcock and South East Stars trio of Paige Scholfield, Phoebe Franklin and Bryony Smith as Players of the Month this year.

Derbyshire opener Reece produced a fantastic September, earning 96 points on the MVP table to win the Player of the Month award.

The 33-year-old amassed an incredible 421 runs in the LV= Insurance County Championship, alongside taking two wickets.

The left-handed batter managed to win two Match MVP awards during the month, earning 21 points against Sussex for his 86 in a rain-affected draw.

Against Glamorgan, Reece produced the highest individual MVP points score of the month with 57, thanks to two outstanding innings. His 139 in the first innings was followed up with an unbeaten 119 in the second.

Reece received a bespoke Mappin & Webb trophy for winning PCA Player of the Month and described what it meant to win the accolade.

“It’s very humbling winning the award, knowing that it’s a public vote and seeing that the fans think I deserve this award. It’s more motivation for me to try and get better and put in those good performances to repay the faith that they’ve shown me.

“I’d like to thank the fans that have supported me in recent years, despite my injuries, they have stood by me and hopefully I keep rewarding their support going forward.

“I hit a good patch of form in September and thankfully I was able to put in some good performances at the back end of the season.

“Before this season, scoring back-to-back hundreds wasn’t something that I’d done before so to do it twice this season was very pleasing.

“I’m now hopefully in the peak of my career and I want to put in as many performances to try and win games for Derbyshire. Next year we need to turn the draws into wins and challenge for promotion to Division One.”

Thunder’s young off-spinner has claimed the Player of the Month thanks to 58 MVP points.

The 19-year-old Scottish international took 14 wickets during September with an unbelievably impressive average of just 9.3.

Winning the Match MVP against Western Storm, Bell earned 17 points for figures of 10 overs, four maidens, 3-30, which included dismissing the Storm’s top three batters.

Bell also bowled brilliantly against Northern Diamonds taking 4-32 and South East Stars claiming 4-23 and received her bespoke Mappin & Webb trophy and described her surprise at winning the award.

“It’s brilliant to be voted for by the fans. I’m very thankful and it’s nice that my performances have been recognised but that’s down to the staff and the team. I’m pleased I’ve been given the opportunity to do well.

“I’ve been given some good phases of the game to bowl in and it’s been fun to get some wickets this month.

“Seeing the calibre of players that were nominated, I’m very surprised that I’ve won, the other girls all had great Septembers and I got the backing of the team and was able to feel very comfortable.

If you look at the women’s game at the moment there’s a lot of young talent and the direction of the game is very good because there’s lots of young players that will be getting better over the next few years which is exciting.

“We should be aiming for a trophy next year, I’d love to be part of a Thunder side that wins a trophy and I think we have an exciting team that could do that.”

Find out more about the PCA MVP Rankings and view the men’s and women’s tables.