The reasons behind Root stepping down as captain

The recent ten-wicket loss against the West Indies was the last nail in the coffin for Joe Root who stepped down as England's Test captain on Friday. The Yorkshireman holds the record for the most Test wins (27) and most runs as captain (5295). He has been in sublime touch with the bat with more runs than anyone else in the ongoing ICC Test Championship but couldn't live up to the expectations as a leader.

Under him, England won just one out of the last 17 Tests and lost their last five Test series.

Root as captain - highs and lows
Root's captaincy career started off in the best way possible in 2017 after he took over from Alastair Cook as he smashed a brilliant 190 and England won the series 3-1 over South Africa. 

Probably his greatest achievement as captain was the 4-1 win over India in 2018. Root was in good touch in the series, managing one match-winning hundred. 

Last year they toured Sri Lanka, a quite tough place to visit for the likes of England, Australia, South Africa and New Zealand. But Root batted magnificently well and inspired his team to bag a 2-0 series win. 

But the Ashes has always been Root's achilles heel as he could never win a series against Australia since he took charge five years ago. England under him were thrashed by Australia in his first Ashes as captain and the result remained the same in his last. 

The last Ashes series will remain the lowest point of Root's captaincy as England failed to even put up a fight in down under. The visitors failed to score 300 once in the entire series and even got bowled out for 68 in the Boxing Day Test.

They say, "A captain is only as good as his team." No one can question his batting ability but he failed to inspire the team enough with that. Under his captaincy, England have averaged only around 29 per wicket, which was much worse than the records under his predecessors Alastair Cook, Andrew Straulows, Michael Vaughan and Mike Atherton. 

After the Ashes, the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) sacked head coach Chris Silverwood and director Ashley Giles but Root survived. But his hopelessness and indifference to the plans of bowlers were exposed after the second Ashes Test when he said that the bowlers did not bowl the right lengths. He fell short tactically multiple times, especially on dead pitches where he quickly ran out of options. England have so often let the game drift from strong positions as Root rarely showed creativity as captain. 

The likes of Mike Atherton, Ricky Ponting, Ian Chappell, Steve Harmison, and Nasser Hussain have been critical of Root's captaincy. Brendon McCullum, one of the finest modern-day captains, said that he never saw leadership qualities in Root. 

Who can replace him
There are not many people in the England Test team who can say that their places in the team are guaranteed. And there are not many people who can captain the side other than Root. Ben Stokes is possibly the best option and Mike Brearley, considered one of the greatest captains of all-time, believes that it's time to hand over the captaincy to Stokes. But the all-rounder is reluctant to take up the role and it may not be wise to overload him with captaincy especially when he has returned from a 'mental break'.  

There is another option to make Stuart Broad the captain of the Test side. Broad has a good understanding of the game, captained the team before in ODIs and T20Is and is a good analyst based on his observations in the commentary box. But that move is highly unlikely as he along with James Anderson have been dropped from the team recently and the ECB might not bring them back anytime soon.

Can England opt for a specialist captain? Gone are the days when England were skippered by a specialist captain - Mike Brearley. There are not many options right now and under the circumstances, can they play a gamble and bring back Eoin Morgan? It's unlikely because Morgan last played first-class cricket three years ago.

But with Root resigning, England will be faced with a big problem as there are not many captaincy options in the team. Stokes could bring a lot more spark and he showed that against Pakistan last year when he led a pretty inexperienced side to an ODI series win.

Now it all depends on whether he is willing to take up the role.