England captain Joe Root: “I’ll control as much as I can; I don’t think it’s ever in your hands… I feel like the group is way behind me. We’re doing a lot of really good things, I just need to turn that into results now”
Joe Root is consoled by his vice-captain Ben Stokes after England’s 10-wicket loss in the third Test against West Indies.
Joe Root says he wants to continue as captain of the England men’s test, even though his team fell to the West Indies in a 10-wicket loss in the third test in Grenada, making it a run of five series without victory.
England’s loss completes a run of results where they have only a solitary Test victory to show from their last 17 games dating back to February 2021.
Such a miserable stretch has given rise to speculation about Root’s future as captain, but he spoke of his determination to continue at the end of the day.
“I made it pretty clear at the start of this game and throughout this tour that I’m passionate about trying to get this team forward,” he said, before adding: “I’ll control as much as I can, no I don’t think it’s ever going to be in your hands.” .
“I feel like the group is very supportive of me. We’re doing a lot of really good things, we just need to turn that into results now.”
Root added that he had seen growth from his side over the course of the series, particularly in the first two tied Tests, lamenting his old batting woes that returned with two first-order collapses in the third.
“Immediately it’s the frustration of how it ended, because throughout this series I think we played very good cricket,” the skipper said.
“We’ve shown what we’re capable of as a group, we’ve grown in the first two games as a hitting group, we’ve shown great strides in that department and then yesterday he really let us down, really hurt us.” .
“It was a big day in the series and we just didn’t weather it well enough. Now we find ourselves in this position where we end up losing the series when we played such brilliant cricket.” “
Root added: “I think the attitude throughout the tour has been brilliant; in that sense, we’ve made some big improvements.
“That has to continue. There’s a lot we can take from this, of course we came here to win and it’s frustrating that we haven’t, but if we’re going to keep learning, keep growing as a team and if we want to start winning, we have to keep that focus.
England’s interim head coach for the West Indies tour, Paul Collingwood, has given his backing for Root to continue as captain, saying the dressing room “is united and right behind Joe”.
“You can see that all the players, the management and Joe himself have a determination to move this team forward and get results,” Collingwood said.
“If I was standing here and I didn’t think that, then there would be a problem.
“Leadership doesn’t affect his hitting, he just keeps going out there and scoring runs. And he’s desperate to turn things around and make this team the best it can be, simple as that.”
As for his own future and whether he would be willing to take on the role of England manager full-time, Collingwood said: “If [the ECB] decided that they want to give me the job, I would certainly take it.
“I have enjoyed it much more than I expected. I feel like there’s been a really good response from the players.
“Of course there will be excitement around this game and disappointment, but I wanted to make a difference, make a change in the three weeks I had in charge. Hopefully there has been a change within the dressing room.”
Collingwood added: “There’s a lot that’s going to happen and change in the run up to the English summer test, we’ve got a new CEO coming in, he’s going to decide what structure we go with, what kind of coaches we need in place, and then it’s up to them to make those decisions.”
