Alastair Cook praised his former teammate Joe Root after the latter broke his record of scoring the most hundreds in Tests for England on Saturday, August 31.
Root scored 103 off 121 deliveries on the third day to help England post a mammoth total of 483 for Sri Lanka to chase down in the fourth innings. Root’s 103 was his 34th Test century and surpassed Alastair Cook’s tally of 33 centuries, which was the most by any English cricketer in Test history.
Cook praised Root as “simply the best in England” and also mentioned that he deserves to hold the record.
“He is quite simply England’s best and it is absolutely right that he holds this record,” Cook said in commentary on the BBC’s Test Match Special programme. “So take it in, Joe. We are watching a genius.”
“I don’t think there’s a hitter I remember seeing play [who shares] “The sense of inevitability that Joe Root conveys when scoring runs. Today, when I was on sixth, I said I was going to score 100. I know he’s in great form, but it’s a pleasure to watch a master, a craftsman, in action.”
Although Cook praises Root, his first impression of a teenage Root on his List A debut for Yorkshire against Essex was not the same as in 2009.
“He couldn’t get the ball out of the box,” Cook recalled. “Everyone was saying, ‘He’s a good player,’ but I didn’t see it that way.”
Within three years, however, Root had changed Cook’s mind as he took to Test cricket like a duck to water during his international debut in the final match of England’s tour of India in Nagpur in 2012.
“I saw someone who was mentally prepared to play Test cricket,” Cook recalls. “The only test I had was when he came out to bat for the first time, to see how he would handle it.”
“The match was on and he came out to bat with his England cap on, looking like he was 13 and a huge smile on his face. I watched his first few balls and thought, ‘This guy is here to stay. ‘ I honestly said, ‘He’s scoring 10,000 runs. ‘ I don’t know who I said it to, but I know I said it.”
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