Durham man David Bedingham is the early leader of the PCA County Championship Most Valuable Player Rankings, with the MVP having been revamped ahead of this season in its biggest overhaul since 2007.
The South African batsman enjoyed a dream start to the 2021 domestic campaign, collecting 56.4 MVP points on the back of his 237 match runs against Nottinghamshire.
Bedingham’s unbeaten 180 accounted for 54% of his side’s second innings total of 332/4d at Trent Bridge, and his two catches in the match also helped to boost his MVP score.
The early contender for the MVP in the LV= Insurance County Championship leads from Hampshire duo Liam Dawson and James Vince in second and third position respectively.
The international pair’s partnership of 204 helped to sweep Leicestershire aside at Grace Road, with Dawson’s further efforts with the ball and in the field earning him 48.2 MVP points – just 0.5 more than skipper Vince who fell just short of his career best first-class score with 231.
Vince was almost matched in terms of his first innings score and MVP points total by Essex’s Tom Westley. The captain of the defending champions led from the front in compiling 213 in Chelmsford, translating to 47.6 MVP points and fourth position in the Championship MVP after week one.
Middlesex’s Sam Robson completes the first MVP top five of the 2021 season after earning 45.4 points in an ultimately losing cause at Lord’s. The opener could be proud of his individual efforts, however, in making 165 during an innings when no other batsman passed 26, Robson accounting for a huge 54% of his team’s innings total.
The new algorithm takes into account expected performance on every ball according to CricViz’s extensive database, and also considers the historic performances of the venue each fixture is being played at, therefore giving a more accurate reflection of the top performers in the game than traditional batting and bowling averages do.
The MVP will track the top performers in every single professional fixture during the upcoming season and beyond, with an MVP of the Match awarded for every game and competition, and cross-format Overall MVPs named come the end of the season.