Alastair Cook mulls over an astounding Ashes campaign, after Sydney ton
England opener Alastair Cook is a content man after scoring the third hundred of an extraordinary Ashes series where he has amassed a staggering 766 runs in 7 innings. His stats include an unbeaten double hundred in the opening test at
Gabba, and two big tons in Adelaide and Sydney today where he amassed 189 top quality runs.
Cook’s epic knock has put his team in the driving seat and given them a realistic hope of making it 3-1 in a historic series for their team.
After his incredible performance on day three of the test the left handed opener who survived a catch of a no-ball early in his innings claimed that the whole Australian tour is like a dream for him and he does not know yet when the performance
would sink in.
The turnaround in his career has been nothing less than a fairytale after the English cricket pundits wanted him to be axed from the Ashes squad after a string of low scores against http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Bangladesh-c747 at home last year.
"It hasn't sunk in yet, well, it has a little bit," said Cook, who flies back to England at the conclusion of this match, while his team-mates press on to play the one-day series. "When I get home and it's cold in a week's time, and you're
on the farm walking the dog, you think actually, yeah, I've achieved something special. But it would be even better if we play well for the next two days and get the right result."
"Form comes and goes, and I couldn't hit the middle of the bat six months ago," he said. "But that's the secret of sport, isn't it, why form comes and goes as much as it can do, I don't know. But you keep working hard and enjoy it when
you do do well, because there were some pretty dark times last summer and I'm sure there will be in my career at some other time."
The monumental effort of the summer has not tired Cook who is a fit young man with a penchant for making big runs and becoming a real thorn in the opposition’s flesh when set.
The Australians must be sick and tired of seeing him grind them to a halt innings after innings in alien conditions that are not necessarily suiting the batsmen all the time.
"There's the modern game, you have to be fit to bat for a long time, it's not to look good on the beach unfortunately," he said. "I remember turning up to Perth and before I'd even batted for the first time on tour I had to do a pre-fatigue
session. That's how seriously we were taking it, and I was pretty grumpy at the time because all I wanted to do was bat. But little things like that adds on, and you get rewards later on.
Cook’s finesse with the bat coupled with the maiden Ashes ton by Ian Bell has all but closed out the Aussies from the Sydney test. The English team already leads by 208 runs and they have 3 second innings wickets in their kitty.
From there on they would be pushing for an innings win, the English thrust would however jeopardize Cook’s chances of becoming only the fifth man in test history to score 800 runs in a test series.
Though Cook would be slightly concerned about not batting again in the series, one thing is for sure: he would be giving it his all in the field to ensure that the English team wins their third test of the series by an innings margin.
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