NEW DELHI: Former England cricketer Michael Vaughan has criticised Ollie Pope’s captaincy in the final Test of the Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy against India, which England lost by a narrow margin of 6 runs. With Ben Stokes ruled out due to injury, Pope stepped in as captain, but England couldn’t hold off India’s fightback, resulting in a 2-2 series draw.Vaughan pointed out that while Pope thrives as a vice-captain, he lacks the leadership qualities needed to lead the team in high-pressure situations. He proposed Harry Brook as a better alternative should Stokes be unavailable for the upcoming Ashes series, set to begin in three months.“We don’t laud how good some vice-captains are. (Marcus) Trescothick was the best vice captain. I think Ollie Pope is a brilliant vice-captain. But he’s not a captain. And by giving him the captaincy, I can see it a mile off. He’s not a natural leader out in the middle,” Vaughan said on the Stick To Cricket podcast.He further raised concerns about Stokes’ injury record and the implications it could have in a long Ashes series.“I saw that last year against Sri Lanka. I have seen it again this week. Say you get to Perth and Ben Stokes, the shoulder or you know, his body’s in bits. Anything could happen with Ben. Fingers crossed he’s fine but just say you go to Perth and Ben can’t play. I can’t have Ollie Pope walk in as skipper. But I can have Harry Brook because I see a natural leader,” he added.Stokes, meanwhile, addressed his decision to pull out of the final Test at The Oval, citing fitness and risk management.“We took as long as we could to make the decision,” Stokes said before the match. “I came down [to the Oval] this morning to give myself every chance just to play as a batter – bowling was ruled out as soon as we got the scan results. It’s one of those where weighing up the risk and reward, the risk was way too high. Hearing where it could head to, it wasn’t something that was worth taking a risk on. I wouldn’t expect to put any of my players at risk of an injury like this. So I’ll start rehabbing now and focus on what we’ve got coming up in the winter. Once this series was done I was feet up anyway, so it doesn’t make too much difference.”
