Sri Lankan players prominently feature in this year's nominations

Jayawardena who was recently appointed as the deputy to skipper Kumara Sangakkara following the retirement of Muttiah Muralitharan is nominated for the Test Player of the Year and Twenty20 International Performance of the Year categories.

Sri Lanka skipper, the world's top Test batsman, is among the nominees for the Cricketer of the Year and Test Player of the Year awards but star spinner Muralitharan is not among the nominees for any category.

Sri Lanka's Thilan Samaraweera was also nominated for the Test Player award while Tillekeratne Dilshan is nominated for the ODI player of the Year.

Murali not nominated

The awarding ceremony will be held in Bengaluru (formerly Bangalore), India on 6 October.

	Murali, who created a world record with 800 Test wickets is not among the nominees

Sri Lanka's young all-rounder Angelo Mathews is among the nominees for the Emerging Player while Nuwan Kulasekera also features in Twenty20 International Performance.

“For the first time, this year’s awards feature a new category, the LG People’s Choice Award. This award will be chosen by cricket fans around the world who will get a chance to vote for their favourite player online from a short-list of five cricketers,” the ICC said in a statement.

The long-lists of nominations were made by a five-man ICC selection panel chaired by former West Indies captain and current chairman of the ICC Cricket Committee Clive Lloyd.

The panel also includes former international players Angus Fraser of England, Matthew Hayden of Australia, Ravi Shastri of India and Zimbabwe’s Duncan Fletcher.