ENG vs IND: There Was Absolute Clarity That We Were Chasing The Total: Joe Root
Joe Root has been the best Test batter by a mile in the last couple of years. When he was the captain he was scoring runs for England for fun, as he resigned from captaincy he is still scoring runs.
He was declared the player of the series for England against New Zealand before the rescheduled 5th Test against India.
Root was already the highest run-scorer for England in the Pataudi Trophy before the 5th Test was cancelled last year. He continued his good form in the series as he hit another century in the 2nd innings of the last Test and took England home.
Joe Root Has Been In The Form Of His Life
If England had a chance to draw this series by winning the last Test and make it 2-2 it was courtesy of Joe Root who had hit a century in the third game of the series which brought England back into the series after India had won the 2nd game.
Root has also scored 109 runs in the 1st Test as well and had set the template for the series. Till the 4th Test, Root led from the front last year and in the last Test this year, he was yet again at the forefront of a new find approach of England under the new captain-coach duo of Ben Stokes and Brendon McCullum.
Root for his consistent run of form throughout the series was declared the player of the series for England. After the game, he said, “Love playing. It’s as simple as that. The environment has been great and the guys are having fun in the last four weeks. There is absolute clarity that we were chasing it down and there was total belief.
“Absolutely didn’t think of stepping away from the game. There are a bunch of lovely lads and Stokes has the backing of everyone. Our responsibility is to keep everyone entertained and keep it fun.
It is something you are constantly searching for and something you rarely find. You want to keep it as fun as possible. Still watching Jonny bat is great, I just wanted to give him the strike. I have accepted that you aren’t going to have success all the time. As a 5-10-year-old kid, having fun is what you want and that is what is the most enjoyable part of the career.
We have been riding a brilliant wave of confidence after brilliant performances against NZ. The start the two openers got us off to was superb and they put the pressure back on. It made it a lot easier for us and those scores were a lot more than what was seen on the score sheet. It was great fun doing it.
Root hit 737 runs in the series at an average of more than 100.
