Strauss backs 'successor' Cook to create new England side in 'own image'

Former England captain Andrew Strauss has backed current captain Alastair Cook to have the confidence to create a new England side in his own image.

Cook, who has been captain for 18 months now, will now have to forge ahead on his own casting off the previous regime of Andrew Strauss, his predecessor as captain, and the departed coach Andy Flower.

According to The Independent, Strauss suggested that the Cook era can now properly begin as he has finally begun to come out from the shadow of Flower and his (Strauss) combined reigns, which was mostly neutral as compared to when Cook took over, when Flower took over a larger part of the workload.

Despite the comeback of Peter Moores, Strauss believes that Cook will be standing a bit taller and be keen and hungry to take on a bit more and will be more confident this summer than he was previously despite England's dismal winter.

Cook's new team will not properly take shape until next month when the Test series against Sri Lanka starts and neither he nor Moores will be granted much leeway and the report added that if Cook has to discover a fresh assertiveness, Moores has to learn from the mistakes he made last time and they need to win almost immediately.