Interim England Test captain Ollie Pope sought to follow former captain Joe Root’s footsteps to maintain the responsibilities of captaincy and batting after a challenging outing in the first Test against Sri Lanka.
Pope, who replaced injured Ben Stokes as England captain for the three-match series against Sri Lanka, led the home side to a convincing five-wicket victory in the opening fixture.
However, the right-handed batter struggled to make a mark with the bat as he could score six runs in each innings. His dismissal in the second innings came while attempting to play a reverse sweep.
As England bid for the series-clinching victory, Ollie Pope shared to have sought advice from Joe Root on how to excel while performing dual responsibilities.
“I really enjoyed the week. “The runs didn’t come for me, but hopefully in the next two weeks, I can separate my roles as captain and batsman and focus more on my batting,” said Pope.
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“We talked about how being in the field as captain can be more taxing, but it’s about finding a little routine and doing small things to keep the roles separate.
“Chatting to Rooty, who’s obviously got a great cricket brain and is England’s best batter, we just bounced a few ideas off each other.”
The England and Wales Cricket (ECB) on Tuesday, announced their lineup for the second Test against Sri Lanka and made just one change to their side which soared to a five-wicket victory.
Right-arm pacer Olly Stone would play his fourth Test for England, coming in as a replacement for Mark Wood, who suffered a thigh injury on the third day of the opening Test in Manchester.
England’s playing XI for the second Test against Sri Lanka
Ben Duckett, Dan Lawrence, Ollie Pope (c), Joe Root, Harry Brook, Jamie Smith (wk), Chris Woakes, Gus Atkinson, Matthew Potts, Olly Stone, Shoaib Bashir.
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