Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
Watching the ball is always a good starting point.
Glenn McGrath had a reasonable career in Australia.
It's incredible to watch how our cricket clubs depend on volunteers.
I should and can play better. That is going to be the challenge for me.
My life experience has made me realise what's important and what is not.
I loved captaining and trying to win games - but I wasn't enjoying batting any more.
Grief is a bit of a journey, and it is evolving all the time but I am very functional.
Cricket is 90-95 per cent mental. To score runs, you've got to feel good about yourself.
I can understand the argument that the captain should always be there to lead from the front.
I still have ambition to captain England into the 2011 World Cup. I'm very keen to do that job.
I've known Nick Compton a long time. He's a fully-formed cricketer and he's scored lots of runs.
This whole quest to win the 2019 World Cup, that was my job when I was director of England cricket.
The previous generation, such as Alec Stewart and Nasser Hussain, lost to Australia on many occasions.
But there are definitely times when I just need to write to clarify my thoughts and put any doubts to bed.
After time away it always makes you realise how special it is to play for England and what an honour it is.
Captaincy is a confidence game. When the team is winning and your decisions go well that breeds confidence.
That's what sport can do to you: it gives you a lot of heartache and pain, and sometimes the ultimate rewards.
As a group of players, and as a set-up, you need to set your stall out as to what is acceptable and what is not.
T20 has become a longer and longer format of the game. It is more than four hours in a lot of parts of the world.
A cricket team is always made up of 11 different individuals and you want to give them enough flexibility to be themselves.
I have to accept that my role is to gather the runs slowly. Kevin Pietersen is flamboyant, but that style doesn't work for me.
In the cricket world, with a lot of little issues that people are getting in a tizz around, I'm just like: Don't worry about it.
If we broaden the audience for cricket, more people will be interested in all forms, then TV rights and sponsors and crowds will follow.
If you think about the practical difficulties of having a relationship with somebody on the other side of the world, it defies all logic.
I played a very background role in terms of trying to get the environment together but Eoin Morgan and Trevor Bayliss have done a great job.
When I arrived at Middlesex I was the only guy who'd been to public school and I got plenty of stick. But it wasn't held against me for long.
When I came back into the side in 2009 I had to play more aggressively, and did. But I should never have played 127 times for England in one day cricket.
I tie my wedding ring around my neck with an old shoelace. It's to remind me of why I play cricket: for my family - my wife Ruth and my boys Sam and Luca.
Cricket is not rocket science. Bowlers often get wickets through perseverance, accuracy and being patient rather than trying to blast opposition teams out.
The only two times we have peaked above world average is when we got to No. 1 in the world in 2011 and when we got to No. 2 in the world in 2004 under Michael Vaughan.
It's always frustrated me when I've seen other players able to smack balls over the bowler's head and stuff like that. I can't, though. When I've tried I've let myself down.
This perception that a good captain is someone who beats his chest and roars like a lion and gives big Churchillian speeches, that's just not what leadership is about for me.
We are a high-performance environment and guys being professional about how they prepare for games is not something that should be frowned upon. It should be expected of players.
I wouldn't rule out the idea of four-day Test cricket, if we can get the playing conditions right and the right circumstances it might be a good thing in some parts of the world.
I'm happy unless I'm not happy. And I think this is the thing with grief, there is no rhyme or reason to it and it's been completely different to how I thought it was going to be.
People much prefer to feel part of something and that they're appreciated and wanted, that their voice actually holds some sway, rather than just having someone barking orders at them.
I have to watch my language. I think a lot about the words I use in both the public environment and the dressing room. The language you use is a direct insight into how you are feeling.
I am extremely proud of everything I have achieved as a cricketer, and I have found myself very fortunate to play in an era when some of English cricket's greatest moments have occurred.
We are going to try and turn Lord's red for the day as a testament to my wife Ruth, but more importantly as a way of increasing awareness and raising funds for the Ruth Strauss Foundation.
In 50over cricket there are different ways of playing. It's not all about smacking it over the top. It's important someone bats through the innings. That would be one of the options for me.
So I never forget how lucky I am. That's the reason above all else why I'm determined to keep enjoying cricket, whatever the wins or the losses. As long as I do that then the runs will come.
My biggest concern is that Test cricket and Twenty20 cricket are competing too much. They should be complementing each other and the more they clash the more damaging it will be for cricket.
I've always felt that, in the past, there has been a teacher-pupil relationship between the management and the players. But the best teams are run in such a way that the players have a voice.
You can't compartmentalise everything but the more you do that the easier it is. Keeping a notebook is a good way of dealing with it. You can rest from any thoughts if you put them down on paper.
The only thing I'd say about Darrell Hair is that he is a very good umpire. He's very firm and he obviously sticks to his guns. I wouldn't have any qualms about him coming back into Test cricket.
We all live in this little bubble that we just expect to live forever and I think those of us that have been with people battling cancer, you realise, actually, this surrounds us everywhere we go.
I always thought we ought to recognise the blood, sweat and tears - and the sacrifices in being away from home - of former England players, and that current players should know what has come before.
I think it's hard for one coach to do all the formats all the time, and there are a limited number of coaches who have done the hard yards already. You can have head and assistant coaches for each squad.
Some people get on better with some than others but what is absolutely crucial is that everyone knows their roles and responsibilities and trust that your team-mate is going to do their best for the team.
Until you go through a bereavement, you don't know how you will cope. What we have found out is that life is completely different. The foundations that you have been building all your life are knocked down.