2018 – M J Guptill

Martin Guptill

Martin Guptill won the Walter Lawrence Trophy in 2018 with a thumping 35-ball hundred scored for Worcestershire against Northants in the Vitality Blast match at Northampton on July 27. The New Zealand opener’s fiery innings is the fastest century from balls faced in the history of the competition, which began including limited-overs innings in 2008. His hundred is the second fastest in domestic T20 games, 1 short of Andrew Symonds’ 34-baller in 2004, and the joint-fourth fastest T20 century of all time.

Guptill’s fourth domestic T20 hundred came off 12 fours and 7 sixes and propelled Worcestershire to a 9-wicket victory with 41 balls to spare. Reflecting on the innings Guptill admitted, “I had a slow start and didn’t even realise that I’d reached 50 till everyone started clapping, and I had to ask my partner, Joe Clarke, what had happened! Then to complete a century in 15 balls was pretty pleasing. It’s my quickest hundred by a long way, my previous fastest was in 49 balls for New Zealand against Australia earlier this year.”

The 32-year-old Aucklander has played in 47 Tests to date, and in January this year became the second New Zealand batsman, and the ninth overall, to score a century against each of the nine full-member Test-playing countries. He has played in 159 One-Day Internationals, during which he made 13 hundreds, including an unbeaten 237 against West Indies in the quarter-final of the 2015 World Cup, as well as 75 T20 Internationals.

In addition to his national side and Worcestershire, Guptill’s illustrious career has seen him represent, among others, Auckland, Derbyshire, Lancashire, Guyana Amazon Warriors, Mumbai Indians, Kings XI Punjab, Sydney Thunder and St Kitts & Nevis Patriots. His nickname within the New Zealand team is ‘Two Toes’, owing to an unfortunate accident when, at the age of 13, he lost three toes on his left foot following an accident with a forklift truck.

Northamptonshire v Worcestershire scorecard

Martin Guptill’s career statistics

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