Alastair Cook fails to silence his detractors as Sri Lanka find his weak spot again

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By
Sam Peters

While Sam Robson was steadily compiling his first Test hundred for England, his captain Alastair Cook was sat in the changing room pondering where his own next three-figure score will come from.

England’s skipper is in a rut. He has not scored a century for England since July last year and his last 23 innings have yielded just 585 runs at an average of 25.

After a remarkable start to his reign — which saw him score five hundreds in his first nine Tests in charge — it is hard to escape the conclusion that the burden of captaincy is beginning to affect his batting as it’s affected so many England captains in the past.

Cook spoke ahead of this second Investec Test of his desire to silence the constant sniping from the likes of Aussie cheerleader Shane Warne by recording what would be his 26th Test hundred.

He had the perfect stage against a limited Sri Lankan attack on a Headingley pitch with few of the demons the visitors perceived on day one.

But he added just three runs to his overnight score of 14 before prodding with hard hands at an apparently innocuous delivery from medium pacer Dhammika Prasad, edging a regulation catch to first slip. ‘It’s where he gets out every time,’ said one England fan. He was not far wrong.

The big concern for the left-handed opener is that opposition bowlers have, after 104 Tests and 25 hundreds, worked out a method that consistently troubles him. By bowling a full length on or around off-stump and refusing to bowl anything short or on his hips, Cook is being strangled outside off-stump far too often for comfort.

He is made of stern stuff, no doubt. And with 8,109 Test runs at 46.07 he has proved himself to be a world-class performer at the top of England’s order.

But being captain is a solitary place when you are not scoring runs and, as well as dealing with the media, tactical and management elements of the job, the 29-year-old must ensure he focuses enough time on his own game to put right his technical wrongs.

The last time Cook went through a trough like this was in 2010 against Pakistan when he went on to play a career-defining innings of 110 at the Oval which saved his international career.

His immediate future is not in doubt — despite the horror of last winter where he was powerless to stop Australia crushing his side — but he needs a big score soon, if only for his own peace of mind and to enable him to concentrate on the England captaincy, a difficult enough job by itself.

He will gain a measure of peace a few days after  this Test when he visits  his wife Alice’s parents farm in Buckinghamshire — where he goes to find mental solace away from the strains of international cricket — and he will no doubt also consult his old friend and mentor Graham Gooch.

But while leadership  is a lonely place, so is batting. And Cook knows the only person who can solve his woes at the  crease is staring back at him in the mirror.