Captain Root 2.0: more fun but a different kind of burden in leadership reboot | Simon Burnton

There was a moment, late on the first day at Lord’s, of the sort that makes captaincy instantly worthwhile: Ben Stokes chose to bring Emilio Gay in at short leg, Kane Williamson immediately edged the ball into his pad. then into the air, and without even looking to see what happened next Ollie Robinson sprinted into his captain’s embrace. It is a high‑pressure role, perhaps at times unbearably so, but it is not without its rewards.

The first day of the second Test had little in common. not least because the England team sheet had in the intervening period been put through a shredder. The sun shone, the pitch behaved,. as an occasion it felt – perhaps appropriately given the kind of mess England have made a habit of getting themselves into of late – a great deal more sober.

At its heart. Joe Root, back at the site of his last home Test as England’s full-time captain against India nearly five years ago. That was precisely the halfway point of the run of one win in 17 games, eight before that. eight after, during which his team and his appetite for leading it unravelled. As he said when asked on Tuesday about his first experience of captaincy: “I ended up being so consumed with everything I wasn’t the person I wanted to be.” And here he was again. being consumed with everything.

Would we once again see the Root who led. often carried the team between 2017 and 2022, a new Root reshaped by four years spent working with Brendon McCullum? Or a Root who – as Stokes’s stand-in – felt obliged to attempt an impersonation?

He had promised that he had “a different way of looking at the game than the last time I captained”. this much was clear from his unwillingness to adopt defensive fields, the occasional use of multiple leg slips, the experiment with bowling Harry Brook while every fielder but one lurked in catching positions.

He seemed, in short, inclined to have a bit of fun. But the nature of this team also forced him to carry an unusual burden. Before play. Sonny Baker, the 23-year-old Hampshire seamer who is playing his first Test, spoke on Sky about how much he has learned from having Kyle Abbott, the South African who turns 39 on Thursday, standing at mid-off when he bowls for his county.

Here that position was generally taken by Matt Fisher, five years his senior but with only one more Test cap. If England’s callow bowlers needed to draw on real experience it fell to Root to provide it,. he was standing somewhere else.

This is a sport swirled with statistics. one we will never know is how Root’s step count here compared with that of Brook, who spent most of the day standing by his side at second slip. The numbers would not have been close. At the end of nearly every over, while Brook. James Rew, the debutant wicketkeeper, trotted breezily to the other end, Root would peel off for chats with the oncoming bowler, perhaps also with a fielder or two.

But the moment where the two men’s movements most revealingly differed was not one of those. About an hour into the second session, Baker bowled to Rachin Ravindra, the left‑hander guided it with apparent deliberation towards gully,. Jacob Bethell snaffled the catch.

Of the three men lined up behind the stumps, Brook. Rew naturally followed the ball’s flight to their left and were carried towards a celebration with Bethell. But Root could not allow his instincts to override his responsibilities,. he moved instead to his right, where the effervescent Baker was marking his first Test wicket with a display of solo leaps and air-punches.

Then he held back, allowing others to get there first. Perhaps he did not want to steal any of a young player’s glory. Maybe he was thinking already about the incoming Tom Blundell, and the next puzzle to crack.

The essence of playing sport. like the greatest moments watching it, is to be entirely in each moment, to exist entirely in the now. The burden of leadership is the requirement to think always of the next. But perhaps in this role Root can find some middle ground: he is, after all, England’s captain, for now.