Coverage on Channel 4 can help put the game back into the national conversation at a time when Test matches have rarely been more excitingFrom this distance, it looks like Joe Root is holding himself a little differently these days. You can see it in his press conferences, where his answers seem as self-assured as his footwork at the crease. Watch him at work after England wrapped up the first Test match, politely brushing aside insistent questions about whether he should have declared on the fourth evening and briskly dismissing everyone else’s enthusiasm about what he and his team had just achieved. “We can’t be happy with what we’ve done,” he said.Root is sure of himself, where he used to...
The story of England’s first two days in Chennai is the story of one man, and how the score, the bowler, the day, and possibly even the year, faded into irrelevanceIt’s 2016. Joe Root is batting against Pakistan at Lord’s. The score is 114 for one. The runs are flowing. Everything works. Yasir Shah strays on to his pads and Root lap‑sweeps for four. The crowd purrs appreciatively. For Root, at this moment, Test cricket feels like the easiest game in the world. The next ball is tossed up invitingly outside off stump. “That’s 50,” Root thinks to himself, a split second before launching into a slog-sweep that flies off the top edge and is caught at midwicket.It’s 2021. Root...
Perhaps it was inevitable that in being a leader, an ambassador, an entertainer and a salesman, something had to giveThree years ago, I went to Sheffield to interview Joe Root. It was his first summer as England captain and as he parsed his way through a series of solemn, proportionate answers about New Responsibilities and Exciting Opportunities, I became increasingly fascinated by his demeanour. His posture was nervous and awkward; his gestures self-conscious and uncertain; his words stilted and punctuated by short involuntary intakes of breath. It seemed like Root still was still trying to work out whether the England captaincy was something into which you grow or shrink. Whether it bottles you up or sets you free.A couple of...
England need Root at his very best with the bat if they are to have any hope of progressing as a Test team. At the moment they are going backwardsYou had to commend Joe Root’s honesty when he walked after gloving behind a short ball from Anrich Nortje on the opening day of this second Test against South Africa. Yet perhaps the time is nearing for him to be equally honest about his own position as England’s Test captain.To be frank, it just isn’t working out. This latest innings from Root, a largely fluent 35 from 49 balls, offered more evidence as to why he should not be in the job. Related: Ollie Pope delivers solitary shaft of light for...
The England captain needs runs and victories against a South Africa side who have turned to their former captain Graeme Smith for guidance at a time of disarrayThe last time England set off on a winter tour at election time they were also heading for South Africa – in October 1964. On that occasion the political contest had rather more impact on the tour party. Ted Dexter, who had been England captain throughout the Ashes summer of 1964, stood for the Conservatives against Jim Callaghan in Cardiff South East, an undertaking that meant that he was replaced as captain by MJK Smith.Dexter mustered 22,288 votes in Cardiff but – fortunately for England’s middle-order – Callaghan polled 7,841 more than that...