Former England skipper Andrew Strauss on Wednesday said that sacking Alastair Cook as captain before the 2015 World Cup is not an answer to English cricket team’s one-day woes.
The Cook-led England team has lost six out of last seven one-day series. England’s only win was in New Zealand in February last year. “I don’t think the right answer is to just discard him as captain before the World Cup - it’s too close to that event now; you’ve got to stick with him but he’s got to find a way of resurrecting his form and setting the tone,” Strauss was quoted as saying by ‘Sky Sports’.
Strauss feels Cook, who is averaging just 24 against India after three innings in the five-match ODI series, can turn things around in the one-dayers, just as he did during the Test series, where he led England to a come-from-behind 3-1 victory over the sub-continent giants.
“It’s going to take someone to say: ‘listen, this isn’t a sinking ship - I’m going to rectify things’ and Cook has got a massive role to play yet again. We’ve been on his case all summer but he’s got to lead from the front with the bat,” said the former captain.
“He turned it around in the Test series by taking a bit of pressure off himself and saying: ‘listen, I’m trying as hard as I can - I’ve just got to go out and see ball, hit ball’,” he added.
Meanwhile, angry and sad at the way England have been outplayed in the ongoing ODI series against India, former captain Ian Botham and retired spinner Graeme Swann said the performance of the side led by Alastair Cook is nothing short of an “embarrassment”.
“Rarely have I been so angry at watching an England cricket team perform. What I saw at Edgbaston was a joke. A total embarrassment from a team who should have designs on winning a World Cup in six months’ time,” Botham said in his column for The Mirror.
“Instead, they’ll be lucky if they win an egg cup between now and then playing like this. They just never learn and it upsets me to see them making the same mistakes time and time again. The one-day game has changed and we have failed to change with it,” he added.
“It is boring and embarrassing cricket. We haven’t caught up with the rest of the world. It is so outdated, outmoded and old fashioned and the whole strategy and outlook must change,” said Swann on England’s performance. Swann said England’s lack of effort to change according to the present challenge has left him frrling agitated. “If the England management, captain and selectors cannot see there is a burning issue that needs to be changed, then I am worried, angry and sad,” he said.