Former Australian captain Ian Chappell has called Joe Root a “poor captain” after England’s lacklustre performance in the first two test matches of the ongoing Ashes series. After losing the first test in Brisbane by a massive margin, England now stands on the verge of losing the day-night test match in Adelaide as well, as Australia needs 6 wickets on the 5th day of the test to go 2-0 up in the series.
According to Chappell, there is no doubt about the fact that Root’s abilities with the bat are phenomenal, and it’s quite evident that he has been carrying the England batting for quite a while now. But, his leadership is not up to the mark at all and people might call him unlucky because the other players are not performing, but there has never been a captain who lacks in imagination and still proves to be lucky.
Chappell is of the view that imaginative captains are generally lucky because their moves which work are seen as some sort of “miracle” and people associate it with luck, but that doesn’t always happen to be the case. A captain has to be inspirational and has to ensure that his team lifts itself at a stage when the opposition is under pressure.
Ian Chappell thinks Joe Root hasn’t been able to inspire England to seize key moments
In his column for ESPNcricinfo, Chappell mentions there have been a few junctures in the ongoing Ashes series where Australia has been under pressure for a short period of time, but Root has failed to inspire England to lift itself at those junctures and seize the moments. Australia has managed to shift the pressure quickly every time and that’s something which can be accounted to the lack of inspirational leadership from Joe Root.
Joe Root has guided England to overseas test series triumphs in Sri Lanka and South Africa, which are two incredibly tough countries to tour, but his status as an England skipper in the Ashes, particularly in the away Ashes, are rather abysmal.
