Alastair Cook
Alastair Nathan Cook, MBE (born 25 December 1984) is the captain of the English Test and ODI cricket teams. He is a left-handed opening batsman who plays county cricket for Essex. Cook played for Essex's Academy and made his debut for the first XI in 2003. He has played in a variety 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 and debuted with a century. Debuting at 21 years of age, Cook went on to become the youngest Englishman to reach a series of landmarks, making centuries in his first Test matches against India, Pakistan, the West Indies and Bangladesh. He reached the 7,000 run mark on 6 December 2012 in the third test match against India, at Eden Gardens, Calcutta, overtaking Sachin Tendulkar as the youngest player of all time to have made 7,000 runs. He is also the only Englishman to score seven Test centuries before his 23rd birthday. He has scored the most test centuries for England, 23, and is the first captain to score a century in each of his first five Tests in charge.
Despite this prodigious flurry of runs, Cook came under criticism throughout 2008 for a lack of centuries; he replied in 2009 with two centuries, as well as a score of 95 against Australia to help seal England's first victory against them at Lord's since 1934. He took seven catches in the series, including the final wicket, to win the 2009 Ashes series. After deputising as Test captain in 2010, Cook went on to play another pivotal role in retaining the 2010-11 Ashes series, breaking records by scoring the second highest number of runs in a Test series by an Englishman, including his maiden first-class double-hundred and two further hundreds, and batting for over 35 hours during the series. He was appointed as the captain of the Test team subsequent to Andrew Strauss's retirement on 29 August 2012.
Cook was appointed Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in the 2011 Birthday Honours.
Read more about Alastair Cook: Early Life and Education, Outside Cricket
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“A monarchy is like a man-of-war—bad shots between wind and water hurt it exceedingly; there is a danger of capsizing. But democracy is a raft. You cannot easily overturn it. It is a wet place, but it is a pretty safe one.”
—Flavius Josephus Cook (1838–1901)