Alastair Cook has been named as England’s Test captain for their tour of Bangladesh in February and March, after the selectors opted to stop thinking.
National Selector Geoff Miller said: “Andrew Strauss has provided outstanding leadership for the team in both forms of the game over the past 12 months and the selectors feel it is important that the team knows what it is like to have rubbish leadership and we are extremely confident that Alastair Cook can provide this.
Strauss is the only frontline Test batsman to miss the trip. “We still want to win, we just don’t think we need good leadership to do that,” said Miller.
“Our decision to appoint Alastair Cook to the Test vice-captaincy last year was completely random, clearly we had no idea then, and now we have demonstrated consistency with our decisions. We have no idea what we will do next. We’re crazy.”
“Cook’s played over 50 Tests now,” added Miller, “surely that, plus the fact he went to public school, can talk good, is a batsman, and is not from the north is more than enough reason to make him captain. Although we want to make it clear, we had no such reason when we made the decision, but we thought we better backward engineer one. Darren Pattinson was also considered.”
Hoe come it know my blog posts if they are not listed in the blogroll?
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The England selectors seem to live in a bubble where Cook and Bell are considered world class.
.-= Mahek´s last blog ..FICA and the need for a Collective Bargaining Agreement – II =-.
No paksitanis auction in IPL. Afridi mouthed off when he was in australia in BIG BASH. Now no franchise want his as it seems he is like time bomb about to explode for any franchise.
Umar Akmal should have been picked. It seems IPL franchise do not want to hear any name of pakistanis..26/11 still lingers i think. i can’t blame them…
Also most aussies who are not good in 20/20 game were avoided.
Chennai made two stupid mistakes by getting flintoff (slacker) and Oram (freeloader…done zilch) ..before .. they were hesistent to go all out in auction this time.
Chennai hopes Justin Kemp will be better than oram… i doubt it…both suck…in a pressure situation.
IPL is more of what public want to see. …they want to see big name hit sixers than mr nobody come and hit sixers.
Ah… a great little tour for Cook to show ‘solid captaincy’ and Bell to plunder more useless runs. And for Pietersen to possibly get into some form.
.-= Rishabh´s last blog ..IPL 3 – Transfers – You read it here! =-.
Remember i told this b4.. ECB hv a habit they dont seem to get rid off. http://www.cricketwithballs.com/2009/12/10/overused-phrases/
If C’wood can be considered to lead Eng in T20′s y not in tests as well..?
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Seems like England too is thinking that the Bangladeshis are ordinary….
Alistair Cook makes me want to jam a pencil in my eyeball and swivel it all around when he is batting. If he goes about his captaincy in a similar manner, I pray for the Bangla boys to kick some ass and embarrass the shit out of Cooky.
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@dhans – i think toygers have a pretty good chance against england.
Swanny is gutted that he was overlooked
Has there been an earthquake recently, or any other kind of seismic activity, in or around where the selectors are based? Because, really, the only explanation I can come up with is that they all collectively stumbled and hit their heads on something hard, or possibly had something heavy fall on all of them simultaneously.
For someone who went to a posh school Mr Cook has a remarkably chavvy accent. Is he yet another mockney like Damon Albarn or Jamie Oliver, or is this the way all the posh kids talk these days?
What can a Cook rustle up with Onions and a Swan(n)?
Think so Johnny. I had a look on Youtube as I hadn’t ever heard him in an interview and to learn he spouts stumbly generic toss is not too suprising.
Had the ECB not messed Pietersen and Collingwood around and also ignored Rob Key they might have had options. The Peter Principle of Cook’s vice captaincy should have been enough. Vice captain The Cunt Stuart Broad now, surely?
Or they could be working on the premise that he was as good a slip fielder as an emporer penguin, but then worked quite hard and became alright in the field, reflecting an impressive improvement. You could just give him a badge on the pat on the head though, couldn’t you, not the fucking captaincy.
Instead of Marcellus Wallace getting Vincent Vega to look after Mia when he’s away, he’s left Daniel Radcliffe in charge. A Lego Daniel Radcliffe.
I just re-read that and thought that an emperor penguin might be a good slip fielder. If you have one fly in his face he might be able to skewer it with his beak. And you could chuck it to him in between deliveries so he could regurgitate krill on to one side of the ball.
He’d be shit at third man though.
I think england missed a great opportunity to bring a mike brearley like captain. Someone with a dozen degrees, a pHD, has written untold books, is a lecturer in ethics at Oxford, and has the batting average of a bangladeshi, ie. less than 25.
How did they not grasp this opportunity is beyond me.
England are well on the way to out-Pakistanning Pakistan.
Why pieterson is not captain? His stocks dwindled?.
To Alex – Why is Petersen not captain? Have a google about the little discussions in early 2009, Peter Moores and all that.
KP has probably disqualified himself for at least five years after that prime bit of diplomacy. Also, apparently no one likes him. Quelle surprise. This in itself should not stop someone from captaining but I guess it’s the way that no one likes him and who doesn’t like him that’s key here.
Sometimes I feel sorry for the way KP gets treated by the English press but then he opens his mouth and I come to my senses – ‘apart from the ball getting an edge and flying up and hitting my helmet that was a great shot’, as paraphrased from his comments after getting out in Cardiff last year. Sort of like the old saw about the operation being a sucess except for the death of the patient.
I think cricket should do the right thing and celebrate its first openly gay test captain. Anyone who saw that Eng-SA 20/20 match where only Bosman and Smith made decent scores will see what a tactical genius this man is.
It will be really interesting to see whether any dissent emerges from the England camp about this.
With Strauss going, some of the other senior players might feel like they would quite like an extended holiday as well. Also, I wonder how many of them have captaincy ambitions of their own.
Finally, I don’t see how Cook can win from this. If England win comfortably, he won’t get praise because he will only be meeting expectations. If the tour is anything other than a walk in the park then he will be in the firing line.
If Cook doesn’t captain in the absence of Strauss who else is a realistic candidate?
KP has marked his card for the forseeable future & Collingwood’s leadership skills as evidenced to date make Gordon Brown look like Churchill in comparison.
Still at least this “debate” hasn’t brought out the usual lunatic calls for Rob Key.
That qualifies not so much as the absence of common sense as the absence of sanity.
PS
I should have looked harder.
There is one lunatic call for Rob Key.
England big ups for the useless fat lump are so prevalent they’re almost as inevitable as death & taxes.