{"id":899163,"date":"2026-09-20T18:06:13","date_gmt":"2026-09-20T18:06:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/899163\/"},"modified":"2026-09-20T18:06:13","modified_gmt":"2026-09-20T18:06:13","slug":"mccullum-hails-brooks-captaincy-as-england-move-top-of-t20-world-rankings-england-cricket-team","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/899163\/","title":{"rendered":"McCullum hails Brook\u2019s captaincy as England move top of T20 world rankings | England cricket team"},"content":{"rendered":"

England\u2019s white-ball coach, Brendon McCullum<\/a>, was full of praise for the captain, Harry Brook, after Saturday\u2019s eight-wicket victory over Sri Lanka completed a T20 series whitewash and took the side to No 1 in the world.<\/p>\n

Brook, player of the T20 series against Sri Lanka, has now won 23 of his 26 completed games as captain. If he is not yet considered a suitable candidate as Test leader, the cap fits nicely in the smash \u2019n\u2019 grab format.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s grown not just as captain, but as a person as well,\u201d said McCullum. \u201cHe seems very comfortable now as a leader of this side and the guys follow him, they trust him. Obviously his batting\u2019s been on a different planet when it comes to T20 cricket, but I think his ability to do things differently based on what\u2019s required with the conditions, and also against the opposition, has been probably the most impressive element.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cTwenty20 is such an inconsistent game, so you can never take your eye off what you\u2019re trying to achieve, but over the last 18 months or so we\u2019ve found a nice level of consistency. We are not the finished article as yet, but the work we\u2019ve done on the environment and the setup, and the depth that we\u2019ve got in our side now is certainly encouraging.\u201d<\/p>\n

Alongside his relationship with Brook, there is a new guy in town to manage \u2013 McCullum\u2019s old buddy and the new Test coach, Stephen Fleming, who was also at Old Trafford on Saturday.<\/p>\n

\u201cFlem and I are great mates,\u201d said McCullum. \u201cHe was my captain coming through and the great thing about him is he always made you feel like his equal. Our relationship is brilliant and fundamentally we both just want what is right for English cricket and will do whatever we can across the formats to make cricket as good as we can in the time that we\u2019re here. I think our relationship is a real strength, we talk regularly regardless of these jobs.\u201d<\/p>\n

Harry Brook flicks a shot away en route to his 33-run tally against Sri Lanka on Saturday. Photograph: Roger Evans\/Action Plus\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n

And he was confident that their relationship would ensure there was no conflict when there is a clash between Test cricket and white ball commitments. McCullum even drew Fleming into the England huddle before Saturday\u2019s game.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe was a bit reluctant but it\u2019s brilliant to have him around. He\u2019s one of the most successful T20 coaches in the world, so it is quite handy to have him run his eye over the environment.\u201d<\/p>\n

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England begin a three-match ODI series against Sri Lanka on Tuesday. McCullum had warm words about Sonny Baker, whose control and pace has been a revelation. \u201cHe bowls 90mph, has a good slower ball, can swing the ball both ways and is an incredible competitor. He has been tested in international cricket and probably didn\u2019t get the instant results he wanted but he\u2019ll be walking a foot taller now and that\u2019s great for all of us whether that\u2019s T20 cricket, one-day cricket, or Test cricket. People like him are rare commodities.\u201d<\/p>\n

Towards the other end of his England career is Adil Rashid, who will be 40 by the time the next T20 World Cup comes around.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe hope Rash is around for a long time. He\u2019s a world-class performer but we do have to have plans in place. We have guys we are keeping an eye on consistently, obviously Rehan Ahmed has been around our squad a lot and he\u2019s never let us down, there are lots of other guys out there as well. The one-dayers could be an opportunity to have a look.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"England\u2019s white-ball coach, Brendon McCullum, was full of praise for the captain, Harry Brook, after Saturday\u2019s eight-wicket victory…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":899164,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[564],"tags":[64,63,740,85],"class_list":["post-899163","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cricket","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cricket","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/899163","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=899163"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/899163\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/899164"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=899163"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=899163"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=899163"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}