SYDNEY – Retiring Paul Collingwood has been a great servant for English cricket and epitomises the tight-knit nature of the team, Ashes-winning skipper Andrew Strauss said on Friday. Collingwood, 34, said on Thursday it was time to move on and give younger players an opportunity in announcing his retirement from Test cricket. England’s raucous Barmy Army supporters gave Collingwood an emotional farewell on the final day of the fifth Sydney Test as England wrapped up an emphatic 3-1 series victory.
He doffed his cap to the fans as they sung out his name. “I think he’s been one of the great servants of English cricket,” Strauss said of Collingwood. “For the last eight or nine years he’s been very much part of the soul of the England side. “He does a lot of things off the pitch that you guys (media) don’t see. “He does a lot of the hard yards that people don’t want to do and he doesn’t get recognition for that.” Strauss said Collingwood would be a big loss for England’s Test team.
“He’s going to be a big loss for us, I really do think he will be because he epitomises everything this England side is about,” he said. “We’re going to miss him greatly.” While he will no longer be a part of Test cricket, Collingwood will remain England’s Twenty20 captain and play for the one-day team, the England and Wales Cricket Board said. Collingwood was under increasing pressure to keep his number five batting spot after a dismal run at the crease during this Ashes series that garnered just 83 runs at 13.83.
accurate bowling behind Ashes triumph: England did not have a secret formula to secure an Ashes triumph that skipper Andrew Strauss says was built on good old fashioned virtues of hard work, discipline, patience and accurate bowling. Strauss joined Len Hutton as the only English captains to win an Ashes series home and away against a full-strength Australian side in a five-match series after the 3-1 triumph, sealed with a third innings victory on Friday.
“There are no real secrets, you’ve seen what our teams about, it’s about a lot of discipline and patience and building pressure and relying on performances from all 11 people,” Strauss told a news conference. “It’s not often you get as many people in great form as we have had on this tour but when you do, it’s a pretty hard force to stop.” Strauss said the seeds of the victory had been born in the dark days of the 2006-07 tour, when England were humiliated 5-0 to have the Ashes wrenched away from them.
“I certainly had a feeling after the last Ashes out here that the best way to compete out here was to strangle the opposition and to do that you need very accurate bowlers,” he recalled. “That was a thought that I had but fortunately accurate bowlers turned up at the right time, Jimmy Anderson improved dramatically, Stuart Broad gave us some hostility but was also very accurate as well. “The likes of Finny (Steve Finn), Chris Tremlett, (Tim) Bresnan. A squad of bowlers which we knew pretty much what we were going to get out of them. We were very fortunate that those guys delivered so the plan was able to work.”
Even when the personnel were in place, Strauss was still unsure whether they would deliver in Australia. “I think when you come out here, you’re slightly concerned because you know the pressure’s going to be at its greatest,” he said.
