Alastair Cook scores a brilliant century to make the start of his non captaincy period special

Essex and Alastair Cook are back and mean business. With the help of Cook’s masterful century, Essex won the match with an eight-wicket victory over Somerset in the Specsavers County Championship held at Taunton. This was Cook’s first competitive match since resigning as the England captain in February and he made it an occasion to remember. The former England skipper reached his 57th first-class century and acted as the backbone for Essex in their remarkable chase of 255 against Somerset.

In the first innings, Somerset scored 209 runs. Peter Trego scored 48 runs with 5 boundaries and 1 six and was the highest scorer for the team. Essex had a forgetful first inning as they were bundled out for a mere 129 runs. Alastair Cook turned out to be the lone warrior in the inning as he scored 52 runs in 94 balls which included 9 boundaries. But the stylish left-hander fell victim to Lewis Gregory as the later knocked down his stumps.

Somerset lead by 80 runs and opened their second innings with Dean Elgar and Marcus Trescothick. But the Essex team bowlers did a very good job and Neil Wagner was the pick of the bowlers with 6 wickets to his name. Due to their tremendous bowling, Somerset managed to score only 174 runs and they set 255 runs as the target for Essex. During the second innings, Essex openers Nick Browne and Alastair Cook shared an 82 run opening partnership but Browne lost his wicket with an individual score of 35 which included 4 boundaries.

Then Cook was joined by Tom Westley and they both shared a 134 run second-wicket stand. Cook brilliant innings of 110 runs came to an end as he pulled a short ball from Dean Elgar to James Hildreth. But, Westley’s unbeaten stint of 86 runs took the visitors to their target of 255 in 84.1 overs. Currently, Essex are placed 3rd in the points table with 11 points (1 win and 1 draw) while Somerset lies at the 6th position with 4 points.