Does Cook go? Yes or no?

[hopeforthebest]

Mixed messages from the team management, Farbrace says Cook is penciled in to captain in the ashes and Bayliss admitted that the result of the India series could influence Cook's decision, so no we want him for the ashes there.

[Arthur Crabtree]

Id like to see the purge of all the deadwood in the management. Like Bayliss have a year where he isnt having Flower breathing on his neck, where he gets to pick his own leader for the team, and where the so far worthless appointment of Andrew Strauss is reversed.

Sounds like a quote from my letter to Santa.

[hopeforthebest]

Id like to see the purge of all the deadwood in the management. Like Bayliss have a year where he isnt having Flower breathing on his neck, where he gets to pick his own leader for the team, and where the so far worthless appointment of Andrew Strauss is reversed.

Sounds like a quote from my letter to Santa.

Don't think you'll get much help there AC, Santa is very much a figure of the establishment.

[Arthur Crabtree]

Delivered into enemy hands then.

[hopeforthebest]

Delivered into enemy hands then.

Sadly yes, a contingent of Beefeaters are probably on the train heading your way.

[Arthur Crabtree]

At least I won't have to go to work tonight.

There is an assumption that Strauss picks the skipper, and it is up to Cook if he goes. Pretty sure under Flower, the coach picked the captain, but it had to be okayed by the ECB.

[braveneutral]

Flower must be the one that Strauss has to get approval from!

Been nice to read your views MS. Feel like I haven't read much of you lately.

[sussexpob]

There is an assumption that Strauss picks the skipper

Nah, hes only there to oil the wheels with his undoubted charisma, and to occasionally TS Eliot people over the phone....

[hopeforthebest]

I always thought it was the selectors who picked the captain but perhaps that was before central contracts.

[Making_Splinters]

I don't think anyone is saying there aren't alternatives, well the plural might be slightly wrong, or that Cook is a particularly great captain. The point I'm trying to make is, that Cook is not the reason England have been having issues. Switching him with anyone else is a case of deck chairs on the Titanic.

Captains don't win matches, batsmen, fielders and bowlers do that.

What do you think goes through the mind of bowlers like Stokes, Woakes, Ball who often bowl without a slip and see an edge fly through that vacant area. A captains decisions must influence the moral of his team. No captain I can remember has bowled a pace man without a slip the way Cook frequently does. A captain can't greatly influence a batsman's run scoring but the way he sets his field and handles his bowlers is very important. A bowlers international career can be affected.

Most of the bowling plans are set before the game, so while Cook could go off piste, the actual planing isn't really his deal. As I mentioned before, it's easy to look good with your bowlers when you can throw them the ball and let them get on with it. Warne and Pidgeon used to set their own fields under Ponting, Swann did for England as does Anderson mostly.

Heck, Stokes is allowed to go and field where ever he wants!

[Arthur Crabtree]

If a plan is decided upon before a session/game/day it soon enough can get shot to hell. A captain needs to think on his feet. When things are not going well, by definition a plan is not working.

[Arthur Crabtree]

I find the idea of dropping Cook, when we've been completely unable to find an opener since Strauss retired, as somewhat novel, Hope.

I think you may be somewhat over egging the pudding on this one, drats, there I go again.

Cook doesn't really have any imput on the real issues that are dragging the England side down, but let's blame him anyway. It's a bit like banging a load of stats around, as some are trying, with out actually looking at the details. England have had 2 or three bad losses under Cook, by that I mean losses that England shouldn't be having.

We've had 8 Test against Pakistan in the UAE and India in India which accounted for half of those losses in the last few years.

I agree it is somewhat perverse of me to suggest Cook give up the captaincy and opening but whilst he remains whoever takes over as captain will have an elephant in the room. I know in the past ex captains have remained in team but how successful has it been. Gower and Botham were probably nothing but trouble to their successors and Cook doesn't strike me as an easy person to get along with. Hussain and Vaughan must have been interesting. Anyway are we really short of promising openers or is it that the selectors are simply making it appear so.

No way! The captain has to manage the talent in the side. Surely it couldn't happen that a captain would be tolerated who couldn't cope with differences of opinion, clashes of personality, mavericks...

[sussexpob]

There is no reason to suggest that a player cant be captain and fall back into the ranks. I dont want to unnecessarily tear Cook apart, I think a lot of his personality flaws we highlight are towards his role as a leader, and not criticisms of him as a general person. I dont think Cook is anything more than a model professional who would accept his demotion with class. The more selfish version of Cook was the creation of an ECB attempt to back him at all costs and create a mini cult of personality about him (the captain steel nonsense we heard, that was laughable). I think you have to appreciate that its been a difficult tenure for Cook, and in certain extents he may have done well, but his time feels like its expired, that England need a new dynamic.

I also dont understand how Splints can say Cook is just bowling to a plan. If he is, and the plan is not working, then its enough to state that he is a failure as captain to not react or have the balls to make changes. This is where a captain really earns his money on the field.

Cook still has a lot to contribute to English cricket, and that should be the message should they strip him of the job.

[sussexpob]

My problem with Cook is more that the issues are consistent, of the same nature. The failure to attack batsman that are new to the crease. The failure to attack lower order players that bat a bit and treat them like they are Tendulkar on a score when they walk to the crease. The way he gets lost in long innings with his bowling plans. The tendancy to get one pacer to bowl a long spell as fast and short as he can to break a set partnership (that hardly ever works). The lack of men round the bat for the spinners.

Hes become predictable in his failures. When things go wrong he is very static. And he's not very creative. The same tactics get trotted out as his ideas, he doesnt seem to have a cricketing brain to come up with ideas based on what he sees.

[hopeforthebest]

Reading what's around I'm getting the impression that the ECB are pulling out all the stops to keep Cook as captain. Fafbrace suggesting Root isn't ready for captaincy, getting the massage out that the players (all of them, some with arms twisted?) are fully behind him. With Cook's nature to believe only he can do the job, the signs are that in January Strauss will tell him he's the greatest and he'll stay.