STRAUSS GIVES COOK MORE TIME TO DECIDE
THE England captaincy plot thickened here yesterday when Andrew Strauss gave Alastair Cook extra time to decide on his future. Cook will be told there is no rush to decide whether this is the right time to hand over to Joe Root when he meets his old opening partner, and now England’s director of cricket, today to discuss what went wrong in the 4-0 Test defeat by India. Cook was expected to step down today after looking a beaten man in Chennai before Christmas when England were outplayed and their captain was out-thought by India skipper Virat Kohli. Yet this latest development clearly means that Strauss is in no hurry to throw Root in at the deep end at a time when his batting is integral to England’s fortunes in all formats. But Strauss will want to be convinced Cook retains the hunger and desire to carry the Test team forward for another year until the next Ashes before he makes a decision. With the next Test not coming until July, Strauss believes Cook deserves longer than the three weeks he has spent at his family farm in Bedfordshire to let the dust settle on such a heavy Test series defeat. This move increases the chances of Cook carrying on, but it would not be a surprise if the delay only leads to Cook still resigning — but the decision being taken later, without distracting Root while he is on the one-day leg of the India tour. The captain-in-waiting arrived here yesterday, after his brief paternity leave, but could only watch as England were given a chastening reminder that white-ball cricket will be just as difficult in India as the red-ball game proved to be. India A handed them a six-wicket thrashing with more than 10 overs to spare at the Brabourne Stadium in the second of two 50-over warm-up games ahead of Sunday’s first of three one-day internationals in Pune. And the pressure was again cranked up on one-day captain Eoin Morgan who was out first ball in the softest of fashions, lobbing a return catch to Shahbaz Nadeem, as England collapsed to 282 all out. There was also the bizarre dismissal of Jason Roy who was deemed to have hit his own wicket when the side protector on his helmet was dislodged as he attempted a pull shot and
fell down on to the stumps to dislodge the right bail. Only a last wicket stand of 71 between Adil Rashid and David Willey saved England from an even greater defeat, with Jos Buttler also being dismissed first ball and Moeen Ali failing for the second time in consecutive warm-ups. It was not without irony that England’s best batsman, as in the first game against India A, was one who is not expected to play on Sunday. Jonny Bairstow raced along to 64, but, as with Sam Billings who made 93 in Tuesday’s three-wicket win, it is hard to see how he can be fitted into the team