{"id":641793,"date":"2026-06-16T14:56:08","date_gmt":"2026-06-16T14:56:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/641793\/"},"modified":"2026-06-16T14:56:08","modified_gmt":"2026-06-16T14:56:08","slug":"england-vs-new-zealand-joe-root-to-captain-on-game-by-game-basis-but-is-envious-of-ben-stokes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/641793\/","title":{"rendered":"England vs New Zealand: Joe Root to captain on ‘game-by-game basis’ but is ‘envious’ of Ben Stokes"},"content":{"rendered":"

Stokes, a close friend of Root’s, was left out of England’s squad after he breached the team’s midnight curfew the night after victory in the first Test and was present when a member of England’s security staff was struck by a Saracens rugby player.<\/p>\n

Root said he has spoken to Stokes since last week’s incident but he wanted to keep their conversations private. He maintained Stokes still holds the respect of the dressing room.<\/p>\n

Root’s previous tenure ended with a run of one win in 17 Tests and he said he would have rated the chances of him becoming skipper again a “0.1% chance” earlier this year.<\/p>\n

Last year, he said the “ship had sailed”<\/a> in regards to him becoming England’s white-ball captain.<\/p>\n

Speaking on Wednesday, Root said: “Let’s not look beyond this week.<\/p>\n

“That’s the most important thing, trying to deliver a really good performance this week.<\/p>\n

“It’s quite a young group of players. So, [I want] to offer my experience in that capacity and focus purely on trying to deliver this week.”<\/p>\n

Root has been chosen over vice-captain Harry Brook, who was overlooked amid his own off-field controversy in Wellington<\/a> when he was clocked by a bouncer the night before a white-ball game last winter. <\/p>\n

He will lead an inexperienced England team, including debutants Jordan Cox and Sonny Baker this week. <\/p>\n

It is still unclear whether wicketkeeper Jamie Smith, whose wife is expecting their second child, will be available. If not, a third debutant, Somerset’s James Rew, will play.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Stokes, a close friend of Root’s, was left out of England’s squad after he breached the team’s midnight…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":641794,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[1721,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-641793","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cricket","tag-cricket","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/641793","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=641793"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/641793\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/641794"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=641793"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=641793"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=641793"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}