Key events
Preamble
James Wallace
“Quite simply England’s greatest” Sir Alastair Cook had no qualms about anointing Joe Root thus after the latter went one better than his former captain and teammate in notching up an incredible 34th century in Test match cricket at Lord’s yesterday.
In scoring both his 33rd and 34th tons on the hallowed and sloping turf, Root became the first Englishman in two decades to do the double at HQ. Michael Vaughan was the last, in 2004 against India. The 2005 Ashes winning England captain also called Root England’s greatest player* after his record-breaking exploits yesterday.
Root himself was having none of it.
“They’re all things you want to try and put to the back of your mind and just concentrate on what’s next,” he said to the press after stumps. “It’s nice to get the plaudits like that off two of England’s greatest players. But I feel like there’s a lot more work to be done and a lot more to contribute. When that peters out, I guess I’ll start thinking about that then.”
England will look to wrap up the match and series today, they need to take eight wickets in order to do so. The Oval will host the final Test of the English summer next week and – what do you know – the south London ground may well witness another slice of English cricket history.
Alastair Cook’s 12,472 runs put him as the highest runs scorer for England in Test cricket, Root needs 96 more runs to eclipse his lantern jawed former teammate (once again) and go to the top of the pile. Not bad for a slight kid from Sheffield who couldn’t hit the ball off the square for much of his youth.
Play begins today at 11am, do drop us a line with your thoughts on the golden genius of Joseph Edward Root or, within reason, anything else, the OBO mailbag is open.
*Vaughan did also call Oasis Britain’s greatest ever band earlier in the week, but, well – Whatever.
