Were Alastair Cook to leave the ODI job, Eoin Morgan would be the obvious choice

WHEN Paul Downton, the new boss of England cricket, presents a progress report one topic worth airing is Alastair Cook's captaincy.

WHEN early next month Paul Downton, the new managing director of England cricket, presents a progress report on his review into the Australian disaster to the ECB's board of directors, one topic meriting an airing is Alastair Cook's captaincy.

Various management figures, including Downton, have endorsed Cook's leadership since the Ashes were surrendered, while Cook himself indicated after Friday's consolatory win in Perth that he wanted to carry on leading the one-day side through to next year's World Cup. A week ago, after the ODI series was lost, he was clearly having doubts.

That Cook can so swiftly change his mind on the matter hardly inspires confidence; neither should anyone be deceived by the team's improved showing in what was a dead rubber. Cook, when he first spoke so candidly, rightly held himself responsible for England's loss of a match in Brisbane that was all but won.

As that last hour at the Gabba showed, Cook is not an instinctive tactician, something he more or less admitted early in the tour after Shane Warne made another of his withering assessments of Cook's captaincy. Cook knows he needs to improve and, given his diligence, will try to do so.

But turning yourself into a good captain is less easy in the shorter formats than it is in Test cricket, where the game's slower tempo and regular breaks allow for consultation with coaches and analysts. In ODIs, a captain is alone for the entire opposition innings, apart from exchanges of messages during drinks breaks.

Most countries appoint ODI captains to whom the rhythms of the shorter formats come as second nature: men such as AB de Villiers of South Africa, Brendon McCullum of New Zealand and Angelo Mathews of Sri Lanka. That is not the case with Cook, who had played 26 ODIs in five years before his elevation to the leadership in 2011.

Compare Cook's management of a tight finish in Brisbane with MS Dhoni's shrewd shuffling of his India bowlers - against Cook's England - in the Champions Trophy final last summer, which conjured a winning position out of a losing one.

Eoin Morgan, who may well take charge of England in an ODI series in West Indies in March designed as a warm-up for the World Twenty20, and from which Cook will be excused, possesses just such instincts.

Morgan's focus on limited-overs cricket might have been detrimental to his Test aspirations but it has given him experience of domestic one-day tournaments in four different countries in the past 12 months alone. It's in his blood.

Rightly, England rate Morgan's cricketing brain and his coolness under pressure. That is why they have used him as Cook's deputy in the past. Were Cook to leave the ODI job, Morgan would be the obvious choice rather than Stuart Broad, the Twenty20 captain, whose bowling makes his availability less certain. A bonus is that Morgan might get the best out of good friend Kevin Pietersen.

While England would be only too happy if, say, Alex Hales took his chance in the ODIs in the Caribbean to show that he was more than a Twenty20 specialist, Cook need not necessarily give up his place as a batsman if Morgan was asked to lead the ODI side, who after the Caribbean have four five-match series to prepare for the World Cup.

THE SUNDAY TIMES