With less than a week to go before the release of Wisden 2017, here are a few predictions for the 154th edition’s Five Cricketers of The Year.

• Chris Woakes
  Not for nothing was the 2016 season described on Twitter as the #SummerOfWoakes. Before the start of the season, he was on the verge of being another of England’s “nearly” men; now, he’s close to irreplaceable. His 9-36 against Durham in the Championship sounded his arrival: called up for the Second Test against Sri Lanka, his summer rapidly went from good to astounding, finishing the season with 34 wickets in the Tests and 48 in all international cricket.
• Younis Khan
  At times in the summer, Younis looked bizarrely out of place, hopping around the crease in a cartoon-like manner unworthy of a batsman in the 1000-run, let alone 9000-run club. Just when he was about to be written off, he produced a masterpiece: he saved the best till the final Test of the summer, a sumptuous 218 that gave Pakistan a stranglehold on the match and, ultimately, a share of the series.
• Yasir Shah
  Everyone loves a leg-spinner, and Shah’s 19 wickets in the series, combined with his evident enthusiasm, gave much reason for excitement. With ten of them coming in a single match, however, the sense was that his effectiveness lessened as the series moved on; nevertheless, his impact was sufficient to help Pakistan share the spoils in a 2-2 draw.
• Misbah-ul-Haq
  Misbah’s calming presence in the captaincy role cannot be overstated, but his batting was also highly significant: his 114 in the First Test made him the oldest captain to score a Test century. The sight of a 42-year-old doing press-ups on the Lord’s outfield was one of the greatest of the summer. Later on in the year, he would take Pakistan, albeit briefly, to the No. 1 Test ranking.
• Jack Leach
  Wild card, this one, but bearing in mind the value Wisden places on the county game, Leach’s 65 wickets may prove hard to overlook. Furthermore, his story – plucked from trolley-shunting in a supermarket car park – is almost impossible to resist, although it was denied the icing of a maiden Somerset Championship. Without him, Somerset would not even have been close.

Now for some long-term predictions for the 2018 edition:

• Quinton de Kock
• Steven Finn
• Haseeb Hameed
• Kagiso Rabada
• Jos Buttler