Thaindian News

Cardiff, Sep 15 (IANS) England captain Alastair Cook admitted that his team didn’t play well in the last two one-day internationals and challenged his team to end the series against India on a high by winning the fifth and the final ODI here Friday.

“You get judged on the results and we’ve won both series. It’s an encouraging start but I think the good thing is, in the last two games we’ve not really played that well, but we managed to get the result which bodes well.

“Most games, especially in tournaments, are very close. It’s good to get yourself used to those situations. If you dominate games it becomes less stressful. But we’ve made some good progress over the last couple of series,” said Cook on the eve of the match.

Cook said England, who have already won the ODI series 2-0, are not complacent.

“Andy (Flower) said it’s amazing how quickly sport can change. The practice session today, you wouldn’t have known what had happened in the series from the way we’ve trained over the last two days. The hunger in the side is there, it should be there, but it’s good,” he said.

Cook said in the absence of Kevin Pietersen, who has been rested, and the injured Eoin Morgan, it is a chance for others to step up their game.

“What’s been encouraging is we’ve had no Eoin or Kevin and others have been given the chance and they’ve stepped up and taking their opportunities well - especially Ravi (Bopara). We do need a squad and 15, 16, 17 players and people adapting to roles in the side and coming in to produce match-winning innings. The competition is there for places, and that can only be a good thing. We’re all pushing to get into that eleven and competition raises the standard,” he said.

On his failure to break in the Twenty20 squad despite scoring an unbeaten 80 from 63 balls in a 23-over second ODI at the Rose Bowl, Cook said: “I was disappointed. You are when your name’s in the that for selection and it doesn’t go your way. But it gives an opportunity for Graeme Swann to do the job and I’ll think he’ll do a good job. The enthusiasm he has for the game will run off on people completely. He just loves it.”

“I think success brings happiness. It’s true when you are generally happy. When you’re not winning, things start to grate on you a bit more than they would normally. And they wouldn’t be if you were winning. But having said that, when we lost in Perth (during the Ashes) our team spirit was still good,” he said.