Ben Stokes Named New Test Captain For England Cricket Team, To Succeed Joe Root

England all-rounder Ben Stokes has been made the new Test captain of the England cricket team and will take over the duties from outgoing Joe Root.

New Delhi: England all-rounder Ben Stokes has been made the new Test captain of the England cricket team. The England and Wales cricket board confirmed that Stokes will be taking over from Joe Root, who had earlier stepped down from his role as the England captain following the Ashes debacle and series loss against West Indies.

The recently-appointed Managing Director of England Men’s Cricket team, Rob Key said that he had no hesitation in offering the role of Test captain to Stokes, who has been one of the top performers for England for quite some time.

“I had no hesitation in offering the role of Test captain to Ben,” Key said.

“He epitomises the mentality and approach we want to take this team forward into the next era of red-ball cricket. I am delighted that he has accepted, and he is ready for the added responsibility and the honour. He thoroughly deserves the opportunity,” he further added.

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Earlier, former India head coach Ravi Shastri said that Ben Stokes remains the best candidate to take England cricket ahead in the Test format and believed it might fire him up to perform even better than what he has been doing over the past couple of years.

Former Sri Lanka captain and currently the head coach of Mumbai Indians in the IPL, Mahela Jayawardena also backed Stokes come good as the England captain.

“I think he (Stokes) will be brilliant captain. He has been around for a while and shown again and again that he is a brilliant competitor and he is a different beast altogether when he is on the field. England haven’t seen an all-rounder captaining their Test team for a long time and I think he is the ideal candidate. Having his type of character (as captain) might create a culture which they have had with white ball cricket recently, but now need to find that same kind of culture with red ball cricket,” said Jayawardene in a recent episode of ‘The ICC Review’ show.