Cook will lead England "as long as he wants it": Trevor Bayliss

England have been completely dominated and outplayed in the ongoing Test series in India and conceded the series 3-0 with another defeat in the Mumbai Test. The visitors have found it really difficult to get hold of the Indian spinner whereas their spinners haven’t shown enough venom to affect the subcontinent batsmen. Having lost the series there is a growing murmur about Alastair Cook’s career as England captain. Rubbishing claims coach Trevor Bayliss said Cook will lead England “as long as he wants it”.

With his spinners not getting wickets despite massive assistance from the surface Cook was helpless and had to spread out the field. He had to make sure they didn’t end up conceding too many runs given how comfortably the Indians were batting. His moves were then termed defensive and his captaincy was questioned. “When you lose, the captain takes a lot of responsibility but he’s got broad shoulders,” Bayliss was quoted by Sky Sports. Over the past 12, 18 months we’ve seen improvements in the way he captains the team.”

The most capped England player has led the team in 58 Test out of which they have won 24 and lost 21 which also includes their first ever Test defeat to Bangladesh that came last month. “From my point of view he has got the job for as long as he wants it. He has brought this group of guys together fantastically well,” Bayliss said.

On a turning track at Mumbai England went with four seamers and just two specialist spinners. Adil Rashid was over bowled and left with nothing by the time the Indian innings ended. Similar was Moeen Ali’s situation while they couldn’t find as much success as the Indians did, England certainly missed another spinner. “We wanted to try four seamers and two spinners to see how it played to our strengths,” skipper Cook said. “We need to play almost a perfect game out here to win and we keep missing opportunities.”