London: England captain Alastair Cook today said it will be “incredibly tough” to beat India in their own backyard but feels his players have the ability to do the job.
An injury-ravaged India were hammered by England in both the Test and the One-day series but Cook says it is different ball game when India play on home soil.
“I certainly think we can beat India. It will be incredibly tough. We need everyone to be playing very well,” Cook told reporters at the Heathrow Airport, ahead of his side’s departure for India.
The five-match series will begin in Hyderabad on October 14. England will also play a one-off Twenty20 against India on October 29.
Cook said India would enjoy the crowd support but his players have it in them to down India.
“We all know what the one-day crowds are like over there. They love their cricket. Delivering our skills when 50,000 or 60,000 people are screaming and when balls are flying all over the place will also be a key factor, but certainly with this squad I think we can do something really special,” he said.
England will be without pace duo of James Anderson, who has been rested, and Stuart Broad, who is injured.
Cook rubbishes Gul’s claims
England’s ODI captain Alastair Cook today rubbished Pakistan pacer Umar Gul’s claim that English pacers James Anderson and Stuart Broad were involved in ball tampering.
Gul had claimed yesterday that he saw Anderson tampering with the ball during Pakistan’s 2010 tour of England and that Broad did the same in the last Ashes series in Australia.
Cook put up a stout defence of his bowlers and said Gul should have approached the authorities, if he had seen such a thing.
“We certainly haven’t tampered with the ball and if he did have any complaints he should have gone to the ICC over that,” Cook told reporters at Heathrow Airport before his team’s departure for India where they are scheduled to play five one-dayers and a T20 game.
“I saw Anderson do it last year when we went to England. Then in the Ashes series Stuart Broad was seen roughing up the ball with his boots. All these methods are part and parcel of the game to obtain reverse swing with the old ball,” Gul had said.
Gul, reportedly, later tried to play down his remarks.
“I was explaining that the ball gets scratched when it is thrown against the rough surface or hits the advertisement boards along the boundary rope. In this manner, I said, every bowler can be accused of doing it,” he told the media in Pakistan.
Cook felt that matter should end now.
“I think he has almost said himself that it has been a bit of a mountain out of a molehill,” the England captain said.
Gul’s comments came barely a few days after Pakistan paceman Shoaib Akhtar wrote in his autobiography that he had regularly tampered with the ball during his career. (PTI)