Gillespie compares Root with Aussie royalty

Joe Root has been given a ringing endorsement by his Yorkshire coach and former Australia quick Jason Gillespie, who compared the recently named Player of the Ashes with the great Ricky Ponting.

With centuries in Cardiff and Nottingham, Root’s impact with the bat was the most decisive of the series, and the 24-year-old added further credence to his status as one of the game’s brightest young talents by briefly usurping Steve Smith’s as the ICC’s No.1-ranked Test batsman after the fourth Test.

Root has averaged 74.08 in that period and is now firmly established as England’s middle-order lynchpin and the man around whom their team will built for the foreseeable future.

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The youngest Englishman to score three Ashes centuries, Root has garnered praise from every quarter throughout his home summer, with Ian Botham speaking for many in suggesting the right-hander was destined to become “one of the greats”.

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And while Smith’s golden run began almost a year earlier, Root has enjoyed a remarkable streak of his own in Test cricket, beginning after his axing from the side for the final Test of the 2013-14 Ashes.

His first knock after being recalled was an unbeaten 200 at Lord’s against Sri Lanka in June 2014, which began a sequence of six hundreds and nine fifties in 17 Tests.

Gillespie, who played 58 of his 71 Tests alongside Ponting, was effusive in his praise for his Yorkshire charge.

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“(England’s coaches) should still be encouraging a positive mind-set with the bat, even after an up-and-down showing in the 3-2 win,” he wrote in The Guardian.

“Joe Root … is one of the reasons why I believe (England’s) future looks bright.

“And just to stress this point again, being positive and aggressive is not about trying to smash every ball to the boundary; you can still show this intent when leaving.

“Ricky Ponting was a player who did this.

“He would still make a pronounced movement when not offering a shot, meaning the ball went past on his terms. Leave with your feet stuck in cement and it betrays indecision, which the bowler will pick up on.

Highlights of Root's Nottingham hundred

“Joe is cut from the same cloth as Ponting in that he makes good decisions and movements at the crease.

“England’s batting is a concern for some but for me the talent is there, they just need to look at how ‘Rooty’ has gone about his business as a how-to guide.”

A statistical analysis of the pair after 32 Tests has the Englishman ahead of the Australian champion, with Root scoring 2,733 runs at 54.66 compared to Ponting’s 2,004 runs at 43.56.