That love of the game has remained so pure. I genuinely cannot ever remember him talking negatively about the game, even in the darkest times of his captaincy. Almost all pros have their moments when they fall out of love with the game, and get worn down and wound up by it. I certainly did, and it was obvious when I was struggling. But Joe has never been like that.
A bit like Jimmy Anderson ending up with 700 Test wickets, no one can claim they knew Joe would go on to break all the extraordinary records he has, and eventually become England’s greatest run-scorer.
But I was pretty confident very early on that Joe would make a very good career out of the game. At 12, he was playing for the second team under my brother’s captaincy, which was when I first realised he had something special. He was quiet, unassuming, just going about his business. He would bat for hours, even though this was adult cricket. He would not get many, but they could not get him out. By the time he had got a contract at Yorkshire in his teens, I had advised my friend and agent, Neil Fairbrother, that he should sign him up sharpish because he was going to go far.
‘He is delightful to watch, an artist at work’
There is a great lesson in Joe’s early years for any kids starting out. Because he was not that big, he lacked power. But that worked in his favour, because he had to work out ways to score runs without being able to clear fielders. That is how he developed all those deft touches to third man and dinks into the leg side, because he could not whack it down the ground. Even as a kid he was a master of finding space behind square.
It has created such a pure technique. His batting is an extension of his personality, in that he is solid as a rock with that little glint of cheekiness in his eye. He is delightful to watch, an artist at work. Batting coaches talk about “owning channel” outside off stump, which he does brilliantly, but in such a low-risk way. We now live in a modern world of crash, bang, wallop, where players’ backlifts point towards the sky. It is a modern craze that delivers more power, and I understand it. It works, and can be great to watch. I love watching Kevin Pietersen or Harry Brook, but give me Root any day of the week.
