Joe Root has completed his 10000 runs in test matches and he became the second English batsman to reach the mark. The past few years went great for the English player as he scored runs with consistency in every condition. In this article, we will draw a kind of comparison between two greats of English test cricket, Alastair Cook and Joe Root.
Alastair Cook vs Joe Root
- Matches – Alastair Cook played 161 test matches in his career whereas Joe Root has played 118 test matches so far.
- Innings – In 161 matches Cook batted in 291 innings and 118 matches Root batted in 218 innings.
- Runs – Alastair Cook made 12472 runs in his Test career whereas Joe Root has completed 10015 runs in his Test career so far.
- Average – Alastair Cook is retired now and his career average in test cricket was 45.35. Joe Root who still got many years of cricket left in him has an average of 49.57 in test cricket.
- Highest score – Cook’s highest score in his test career was 294 and Root’s current highest score in test cricket is 254.
- Hundreds – Alastair Cook will go down as one of the best openers in Test cricket’s history as he got 33 centuries after his name and being an opener in English conditions is never an easy job. Root who is enjoying his best cricketing years has scored 26 test centuries in his career so far.
- Half-centuries – there is not much difference in the half-centuries as Cook had 57 half-centuries in his test career whereas Root so far has 53 half-centuries in his test career.
You will find that Alastair Cook is ahead of Joe Root in most of the stats but we should keep one thing in our mind Joe Root is still playing and got many years left in his career if all goes well for him. So, it might be possible that Root will surpass Cook as the greatest Test batsman in English cricket’s history.
