Veteran cricketers Paul Stirling and Kim Garth have been named Ireland's men and women cricketers of the decade (2011-20) at the Irish Cricket Awards, held on Friday (February 26) night.
Stirling topped the run-scoring charts in the last decade, scoring 5529 runs across formats with the help of eight hundreds.
The blistering opener was nominated alongside Tim Murtagh, Ed Joyce, William Porterfield and Kevin O'Brien and was eventually handed the award for his "world class consistency".
"He has amazing natural talent with power and match-winning qualities. Opening the batting against top-quality bowling attacks, he has an outstanding strike rate which gives the team the best chance of being successful against the top nations," said the judge panel as quoted by ESPNcricinfo'
As expected, Stirling was over the moon after receiving such an honour. The right-handed opener termed it as a "pretty special award".
"It's a pretty special award, I must admit. Over such a long period of time, to come out with something like that… there's so many great players that have been involved over the last 10 years, so to come out on top of that - [I'm] not quite sure how, but delighted to have received the award. It's just class." he said.
Stirling also topped the run-scoring charts in T20s for his country last year, smashing 1187 runs at an average of 44. He was also named Ireland’s international player of the year.
Meanwhile, Garth pipped the likes of Laura Delany, Clare Shillington, and the Joyce sisters- Cecelia and Isobel- to claim the coveted award.
Garth finished as the leading wicket-taker for the Irish in both WODIs and WT20Is in the last decade.
She made her debut back in 2010 and nine years later, became one of the first six years to be awarded a professional contract by Cricket Ireland.
But, last year, instead of committing to a two-year contract with Ireland, she signed up for Victoria.
"It was a decision I'd thought about for quite a while and obviously it was very difficult knowing that my Irish career was something that was going to have to be put on hold for the time being," Garth said.
"Having spent a couple of years out here and seen how the system works, I decided that I wanted to play cricket for a living and unfortunately that wasn't feasible back home. It's been absolutely amazing. It's an incredibly strong side. I absolutely love being a part of it," she added.
Meanwhile, spinning all-rounder Simi Singh won the inter-provincial player of the year award while Laura Delany won the Super Series player of the year award.