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Cook in no rush to call time on captaincy

With no Tests for seven months England captain Alastair Cook will take his time to decide on his future role in the team

England's eighth defeat of the calendar year was perhaps the worst too and it looks as though it may force Alastair Cook to step down as captain.

India may be the world's No1 side right now. However, the manner of their victory in Chennai, by an innings and 75 runs, was humiliating for England, who ended up losing the series 4-0.

Seeing Virat Kohli's team amass 7-759 declared on day four – England's record total conceded in Tests – was bad.

But losing six wickets for 15 runs on the same pitch less than 24 hours later was a dereliction of duty by England's players.

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It was the tourists' second innings defeat inside eight days and the first time in Test cricket a side had lost by such a margin twice after scoring 400 or more in their first innings.

For Cook, there is much thinking to do between now and the second week of January, when he meets Andrew Strauss, his former opening partner and now England's director of cricket, to discuss his future.

All the signs point to Cook standing down and Joe Root taking over as captain.

Cook's words after this 4-0 series defeat appeared to back up that hunch.

"I've got to go away and do some thinking," Cook said. "This is not right time to make decisions as big as that. I need to go home first, enjoy Christmas as much as I can do and then come back in January and look to plan with Straussy and see what's the right decision for English cricket.

"I've got to go away and decide whether I am the right man to take England forward.

"It's the wrong time to make those decisions as energy is low, morale is low and you can make foolish decisions as those times.

"When there's not a Test match for seven months it'd seem very foolish to stand here now and make a decision which you could regret. If there was a Test match in three weeks' time you'd have to think. But while there is a bit of space why not use it?"

Cook said he felt worse after the 2013-14 Ashes whitewash in Australia and the defeat by Sri Lanka at Headingley in the Test series in the following northern summer.

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Yet he has conceded he has felt increasingly isolated during the past few weeks in India.

"I think Australia 5-0 was as low as I could go and Sri Lanka as well at Headingley," Cook said.

"But it's been a tough tour. When you lose games of cricket it becomes very hard and it can be quite a lonely place. Blood sweat and tears went into this tour but the bottom line is we weren't good enough.

"It's been a frustrating year. We've played some good cricket at times and played some pretty average cricket. To lose that many times with the players we've got is disappointing."

Kohli, who was part of India's 3-1 loss in England in 2014, had sympathy for Cook and his team.

"I don't think he [Cook] was asked this question when we played them last time in England," he said.

"I am not in position to comment on what he should do with his captaincy; he has played enough Test matches and captained for long enough to understand what his mindset is like, I can't literally go into his head.

"We have gone through that ourselves as a team and it's never easy, especially when you win two tosses and you get 400-plus totals and then you have innings defeats.

"It's deflating for them as an opposition. I know what they would be feeling like, we have gone through the same in past."

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