England captain Joe Root has been Test cricket’s finest batsman in the calendar year. Having scored over 1600 runs this season Root is head over heels against the next best Rohit Sharma, who has 906 runs in 2021.
Root has scored in all conditions this season, raking up runs in Sri Lanka, India and in his home conditions as well. However, despite scoring eight 50s in his 11 innings Down Under, Root is yet to score a hundred. Addressing the same in the press conference ahead of the MCG game, Root stated that he feels confident that a hundred is just around the corner.
"I feel in a really good place with my batting. I'm playing nicely still. I'm confident I can bang out a hundred in these next three games. I know that's a brave thing to say but that conversion rate hasn't been an issue at all this year. I feel like I have an understanding of how I want to score my runs.”
The England captain has scored two half centuries already in the two Test matches and he has argued that he knows exactly what to do to convert those starts into a big score.
"It's about managing the conditions for me. If you look at three of the four dismissals I have had, they've been in that channel. It doesn't swing and it doesn't seam as much in these conditions, so you feel like you can hit the ball. You feel in control and that can lure you in. And that extra bit of bounce can bring the nick."
Root has only found support from Dawid Malan in this Test match and barring the left hander, no one at the moment has put their hands up to get England to a commanding position in any of the matches. Jos Buttler played an unbelievable innings in the last Test match where he shielded England from a certain defeat for 207 balls.
Root has been vocal about the batting issues of the team, but has not given any indication if there would be any changes made for the Boxing Day Test match.