Alastair Cook

Sir Alastair Nathan Cook (born 25 December 1984) is an English cricketer who plays for Essex County Cricket Club, and played for England in all international formats from 2006 to 2018. A former captain of the England Test and One-Day International (ODI) teams, he is the fifth-highest Test run scorer of all time and holds a number of English and international records.

Cook is England's second most-capped Test player and has captained the English team in 59 Tests, as well as in 69 ODIs. He is the leading run-scorer in Test matches for England, and the youngest player to score 12,000 Test runs (the sixth overall, and the only Englishman). Cook has scored a record 33 Test centuries for England and is the first England player to win 50 Test matches."Alastair Cook's record-breaking career: the extraordinary stats behind England's highest-scoring batsman"
Retrieved 10 September 2018 A left-handed opening batsman (the highest-scoring left-hander in Tests), he normally fields at first slip.

Cook played for Essex's Academy and made his debut for the first XI in 2003. He played in several of England's youth teams from 2000 until his call up to the Test side in 2006. While touring in the West Indies with the ECB National Academy, Cook was called up to the England national team in India as a last-minute replacement for Marcus Trescothick, Pakistan, the West Indies and Bangladesh. Cook played a pivotal role in England winning the 2009 Ashes series, and, after deputising as Test captain in 2010 and then taking ODI captaincy full-time, in retaining the Ashes in 2010–11.

He was appointed captain of the Test team after Andrew Strauss's retirement on 29 August 2012. Cook captained England to its first Test series victory in India since 1984–85. During the tour he became the first captain to score a century in each of his first five Tests in charge. On 30 May 2015, Cook became the leading run-scorer in Test matches for England, surpassing Graham Gooch (8900). After England's 2016 tour of Bangladesh and India, he stepped down as Test captain. On 24 May 2018 during the first Test against Pakistan, Cook equalled Allan Border's record for appearing in the greatest number of consecutive Test matches, with 153, surpassing it a week later in the second Test at Headingley. On 3 September 2018, Cook announced that his twelve-year international career would end at the conclusion of the series against India on 11 September 2018.

Cook was appointed MBE in 2011 and promoted to CBE in 2016 for services to cricket. In the 2019 New Year Honours, Cook was appointed a Knight Bachelor for services to cricket.

On the occasion of England's 1000th Test in August 2018, he was named in the country's greatest Test XI by the ECB.

Early life and education

Cook was born in Gloucester; his mother Stephanie is a teacher from Swansea, while his father Graham worked as a telecommunications engineer and enjoyed village cricket. Cook is a keen musician: by the age of eight he was learning the clarinet and became a boarding pupil at St Paul's Cathedral School in London, an independent school connected to the cathedral, as a chorister, with a rigorous schedule of rehearsals. Cook later claimed the amount of focus and concentration required to keep practising while undergoing regular school hours helped with his batting.

When he was a boy, his family lived in Wickham Bishops, a village near Witham in central Essex. During his summer holidays, Cook played cricket for nearby Maldon Cricket Club, and by the age of 11 he was already playing in the adult Third XI. He played sporadically for Maldon over seven years, with an average of 168 in his final year. He is now an honorary life member of the club.

Aged 13, Cook's musical flair led to him to becoming a boarding pupil at Bedford School, an independent school for boys in the county town of Bedford. He sang, played the clarinet to grade eight and learned to play piano and saxophone. Music was soon eclipsed when the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) came to play against the Bedford School XI. The visiting side were a man short and drafted the 14-year-old new boy to play against his school, and Cook scored a century.

Over the next four years, he hit 17 centuries and two double-hundreds to total 4,396 runs at an average of 87.90, captaining the cricket team in his final year under coach Jeremy 'Boris' Farrell, as well as being President of the Music Society. He also gained three A-Levels and nine GCSEs. In his final year at Bedford in 2003, he scored 1,287 runs for the school, including two unbeaten double-hundreds, averaging 160.87 to take the school record. After his international success, Cook returned for an Old Boys' match at Bedford in 2008, playing for the Head Master's Ultimate XI. Later on, Cook spent two years at Alleyn's School as a PE teacher.

Domestic cricket

Debut (2003–2005)

Having been a member of the Essex Academy since the age of 16, Cook was given his first-class debut for Essex against Nottinghamshire County Cricket Club on leaving school at the end of the 2003 season; put in to field he aided the first dismissal with a catch before scoring just 13 runs in his first innings but pushing Essex to a nine wicket victory with 69 not out in the second. Despite Essex's relegation being assured, Cook still battled away with an opening stand of 122 opposite Will Jefferson in the second innings of his second match, against Warwickshire. In the six innings in which he participated he quickly racked up three half centuries at an average of 47.80. Having secured his place as opener in the county team, he made his maiden first-class century against Leicestershire in May 2004 with 126 opposite Jefferson's 128 for a 265 opening stand, Essex's third-highest but the team failed to secure promotion.

His exploits in his single season gained enough attention for him to be brought in as opening batsman for the MCC in 2005 season's opener against County Champions Warwickshire. With a century in the first innings and 97 in the second, Cook helped secure victory in a match destined for a draw. The season opener would not be Cook's only highlight for the year: as the Ashes approached, Australia were touring the counties and in a two-day match (which did not count towards his first-class statistics) Cook scored a double century and went on to take the first wicket of Justin Langer with a catch in the drawn match days after being awarded PCA Young Cricketer of the Year. A further highlight of the season saw Cook help Essex to achieve one of Durham's two defeats of the season, scoring 107 of Essex's 245 before taking his maiden first-class wicket, followed by another two, with his off-spin. Cook played in every first-class match for Essex and also helped them clinch the Totesport League Title for the first time in 20 years. The end of the season saw Cook finish with an average of 48.03 in the County Championship, hitting four centuries.

Essex and England (2006–2018)

After his England call up, Cook's appearances at Essex significantly reduced. In the County Championship he appeared in only three matches, making two hundreds and another two fifties in his five innings, topping the season averages with an inflated 141.3. Similarly in the Cheltenham & Gloucester Trophy he appeared only three times and again topped the batting averages, only being out once with a top score of 91 and average of 148. He scored less favourably in his one Twenty20 Cup appearance, scoring only nine runs. In the 2007 season, for Essex alone his first-class average was only 58.8 from three appearances, making two hundreds but countering this with one duck and he made a similar century/duck appearance in the (formerly C&G) Friends Provident Trophy during his 5 matches averaging 38.4.
The back to back Totesport/Pro40 champions saw Cook make only one appearance in that competition, scoring 81 not out, before being relegated. They won Division Two and were promoted the following season, though Cook only provided 11 runs in one innings during the tournament. Despite his international commitments Cook managed to participate in at least one match of each tournament averaging 36.16 in three County Championship matches and 15 in his one Twenty20 match. Given time off the South Africa One-Day series, Cook fared better in the FP Trophy with 45.3 from 3 matches including contributing the second-highest in the final at Lord's to seal the trophy.

The 2009 English season featured an early Test series against the West Indies where, despite being in the Test team, Cook joined Essex in a tour match. He scored 76 not out in the second innings before the match was rained off, stopping Essex pressing for victory. Before the Test series he helped Essex force the follow on against Kent in the County Championship but faltered with his team, scoring only 4 in the second innings to lose by 192 runs. After the Test series, Cook was omitted from the one day side leaving him free to play for Essex. He joined them in their bid to defend their Friends Provident Trophy matching Varun Chopra's 65 in a 124 run partnership against Lancashire to gain a place in the semi-final. He and his team could not recreate the same form for the semi-final, at the same location against the same team three days later, after being caught from a running catch by Sajid Mahmood, seeing the team lose by 67 runs. Having been knocked out of the FP Trophy, the team turned to the Twenty20 Cup. Making only his fourth appearance in the tournament since 2005, Cook hit 80 off 56 balls in a match against Kent that was rained off. While his England partner Bopara scored 45 against Sussex, Cook only scored one but made up for this with a 60 run partnership with Bopara days later to put Essex top of the table. Despite averaging 49 from these four games, Cook felt he was a long way from the international squad. In his last performance before joining the Ashes squad, Cook scored a 57 ball century, and batted throughout the whole innings as they beat Surrey, but without Cook and Bopara, the team were knocked out after two successive losses.

Post-England

When Cook retired from international cricket in 2018, he stated that he would continue to play for Essex, signing a three-year contract with them. In the 2019 County Championship season Cook helped Essex to win the title In August 2020, during the 2020 Bob Willis Trophy, Cook scored his 24,000th run in first-class cricket. In April 2022, on the opening day of the 2022 County Championship, Cook scored his 70th century in first-class cricket.

England youth

Cook had his first taste of international cricket playing the U15 World Cup in 2000. Three years later Cook was called up to the England Under-19 team for their tour of South Africa. After it was decided Samit Patel had enough responsibility batting and bowling, Cook was appointed captain of the team the following year, 2004. His first call of duty was the U19 World Cup in the West Indies where he guided England through the group stages and on past the Super League stage, including an unbeaten century-each partnership with Patel against New Zealand, and continued a 100% win record with 87 over eventual winners Pakistan before falling short in the semi-final against the West Indies. He went on from there to captain them in a U19 Test win over Bangladesh before taking the One-Day series too. His career with the Under 19 team was cut short when Kevin Pietersen was called up to replace Andrew Flintoff in the main team, leaving a spot in England A tour of Sri Lanka for Cook.

After the 2005 domestic season he was part of the intake for the ECB National Academy, but this was interrupted as he flew to Pakistan to cover the squad for Michael Vaughan's knee injury. After not being used in the first XI he travelled back with the Academy to the West Indies in the new year scoring 101 in a two-day match against Antigua before youth cricket came to an abrupt halt for Cook.

England

2006: India and Sri Lanka

Cook was included in the ECB National Academy in the winter of 2005–06. The Academy's tour of the West Indies was cut short on 24 February for Cook who only appeared in the first innings, scoring only 6, before being called up, alongside James Anderson and Owais Shah, to the England tour of India to replace captain Michael Vaughan, who was suffering from a knee injury, and opener Marcus Trescothick

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