Not being a Christian, I’m usually fairly poor with remembering what the Jesus holiday stuff is all about.
However, I do know that Easter is when he somehow moved an almighty large rock from the entrance to his tomb and resurrected himself, or something like that.
Anyhow, the point was that he was dead. He had been crucified and was dead. Dead. Dead. Dead. But then he came back to life, or rose up or whatever the Bible says he did.
One wonders how Gideon Haigh would have captured the event? Probably much better than the book of Corinthians did.
Why all this bible talk?
Well, English captain Alastair Cook appears to be resurrecting himself too.
Not that he was ever dead in the literal sense of the word, but it would be hard to argue that he wasn’t somewhere on the Green Mile, heading towards oblivion or hell or wherever ex English Test captains go off to rot. All we were waiting for was for him to tweet a picture of his penis to complete the journey.
This is a guy, who after the last Ashes in Australia, was about as destitute as a polar bear dumped in the middle of the Sahara Desert.
In that series, he averaged 24.60. Ten innings played like a WWI solder in Frommelles suffering from shell shock. It was ugly.
That was followed by a couple of Tests at home against the relative might (and I use the word ‘relative’ quite tenuously) of Sri Lanka.
Cook averaged under 20, Sri Lanka won in England and the captain was losing the love of the proletariat.
After the subsequent 5 Test series at home against India where he failed to make a century, any goodwill that was left was gone. It didn’t matter that England had won the series. What mattered was their captain was boring, out of form and about to be used as a pawn against the tsunami that was Kevin Pietersen’s book.
His failings as ODI skipper leading into the World Cup compounded the views of the majority. His sacking was a welcome reprieve for all.
The media vultures circled, waiting for when the ECB would stop using their poster boy as a human shield against a barrage of discontent and finally remove him from his Test role as well.
Whether by poor management, good luck or blind loyalty, the ECB did not budge.
Cook was the man and he would lead this fine English and Welsh stock into the furnace of the Caribbean. Well, if not a furnace, it could at least be described as a party ground.
Here, Cook would finally break a hoodoo that has lasted longer than time itself. He made a hundred. It wasn’t a great hundred, but it was still three figures.
England couldn’t beat the 8th ranked West Indies. But no one cared. James Anderson had just broken a wicket taking record held by a batting all rounder and Cook was making 100’s again. Well, one of them, plus a 76 and a 59*.
Those with a partial eye to enjoying trainwrecks waited with baited breath for the inevitable to happen against the Boult, Southee and Henry Auckland Express.
Just 10 overs into the match and Cook was back to his old self. Wafting at balls outside off stump and walking back to the pavilion with that all too familiar look of ‘it’s just unfair’ plastered across his face.
He left his side teetering at 3/25.
It was awesome.
Newly promoted vice captain Root plundered 98 in simple fashion. Why can’t we just make him captain and move on?
Isn’t this supposedly a ‘new era’?
Now, back to the Jesus analogy, only because I made such an effort to set it up and don’t want to waste it.
In the second innings with the ball swinging like a 70’s sex party, England fell to 2/25 ….again. However, this time, Cook was still there.
3/75. Cook was still there.
4/232. Cook was still there.
5/364. Cook was still there.
6/389. Cook was still there.
The bastard is going to carry his bat! Well, he may not, but when you are 153* and have batted out 118 overs so far, you may as well.
It’s amazing how one innings, one moment, one score against New Zealand can save a career. Perhaps even resurrect one?
Cook might make a diamond pair in the 2nd Test.
It won’t matter.
He will captain England into the Ashes.
The funny thing is, he’ll probably enter the next battle in some sort of form and leave it unemployed.
Resurrection it may be for now. But desperate people will cling to anything that looks like hope.
Maybe the Jesus analogy I used wasn’t that great?
I mean, no bloke called Corintheans is likely to write a book about Cook once he’s finished.
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Ha ha ha….and so we wait with baited breath, cheers.
Good stuff, but one query. You write: “Not that he was ever dead in the literal sense of the word”. How can you tell?
@jamesdar It was an educated guess