Cricket World Cup History: 4 popular cricketers who never played a World Cup

#3 Sir Alastair Cook:

Alastair Cook

Sir Alastair Cook is one of the greatest batsmen to have played for England in the longer format. He is not only England’s most capped player but also the highest run-getter in Tests. He played in 161 Tests amassing 12,472 runs with 33 tons in that period. Even though his ODI career was not as good as his test career, he never got to play in a World Cup. He made his ODI debut in 2006 against Sri Lanka where he managed 82 runs in two matches.

He missed out on getting selected for the 2007 world cup but came back to the team for the West Indies and India’s series. As an opener, his inconsistency, as well as low strike rate, were the key weaknesses which he failed to recover from. He was able to get only a handful number of matches before the 2011 world cup, but that wasn’t enough for him to get into the team. In 92 ODIs, he scored more than 3000 runs at an average of 36.40. It is unfortunate that a batsman of his caliber didn’t play a single World Cup match.