Picture by Gareth Copley/Getty Images. Joe Root and New Zealand captain Tom Latham at the toss at the Kia Oval earlier this summer. Rott was standing in for suspended Ben Stokes at that stage. Stokes has since retired, with Root taking over the Test captaincy full-time.
“I’m delighted for Rooty,” said Anthony McGrath, his Yorkshire coach.
“He’s our best player, and also very passionate about England, so I think there’s no better man to step in.”
Joe Root has answered England’s captaincy call once again and, alongside ex-Yorkshire overseas batter Stephen Fleming as head coach, will lead the Test team into a new era.
A little over four years since stepping down, he returns to replace his great mate Ben Stokes at the helm, with a home series against Pakistan starting at Headingley next Wednesday.
“It was tough when he last had it, around Covid and how it ended,” continued McGrath. “He’ll probably want to right a few wrongs, if that’s the right term.
“He’s more experienced now, and experience is everything – not just in cricket, but also in life. You’ve been through it before and you know how to go.”
Root’s own view is similar.
“It’s one of the greatest honours you could wish to have,” he said. “I’m very excited by it.
“I’m in a very different place to the last time I did it.”
Picture by Vaughn Ridley/SWPix.com. Joe Root, Anthony McGrath and Adam Lyth in the slips for Yorkshire in 2011. McGrath has since taken over as the county’s head coach and is backing Root to be a success as England’s Test captain.
Of the captaincy, Root said Fleming’s appointment as coach “was a big reason why I wanted to do it”.
“I’m very excited by the way he sees the game, where he sees us sit as a team, and the work that we have to do to get to where we want to get to. All of that got me very excited about taking this role on.
“I’m very much looking forward to working with him.
“He’s obviously got a wealth of experience and done some amazing things within the game as a player and as a coach, and I’m very much looking forward to the next little while and us trying to build something pretty special together.”
Fleming’s first series in charge will be South Africa away prior to Christmas. In the meantime, Root will work alongside interim coach Marcus Trescothick for what is a pretty darn important series against Pakistan.
After the Ashes drubbing Down Under – 4-1 to be precise – England have just been beaten 2-1 at home to New Zealand. They can’t really afford for this home summer to be a write off.
So, while we welcome back former players to Headingley in Imam-ul-Haq, Shan Masood and Saud Shakeel, it would be ideal if they don’t enjoy their trip to the Broad Acres too much!
Fingers crossed, a Headingley win and then a series victory is built upon to set England up perfectly for a home Ashes next summer.
A frustration for Root and Brook that there won’t be a Headingley Ashes Test? For sure. But it will still be a special series.
Picture by Stu Forster/Getty Images. Yorkshire fans will be hoping Joe Root and Harry Brook light up Headingley against Pakistan next week.
Wins are the first port of call, and Root will be 100 percent of that. But the Sachin Tendulkar record haul of 15,921 Test Match runs looms on the horizon.
Root currently has 14,114 to his name.
First things first, though, and Pakistan at Headingley.
“It’s always a huge honour to turn up to the start of a Test series and to get your teeth into what will be a really good contest against a good team in Pakistan,” Root added.
“I’ll be very much looking forward to it, and getting all the guys in.
“It’s going to be quite tricky. It’s a very short turnaround from The Hundred. So it’s going to be important that we start really well in those two days that we have leading into the game.”
Good luck Rooty, we’re all behind you, as will everyone down at Sheffield Collegiate CC.
An England win and a third career Test Match hundred at Headingley would do very nicely thank you!
