Cricket: Genius Joe Root is the best I’ve ever played with - Cook

Joe Root was lauded a genius by Alastair Cook and the best England batsman he has batted alongside after dominant centuries from the pair lit up the country’s first taste of day-night Test cricket and left West Indies already looking bereft.

Cook batted throughout the day for his 31st Test hundred and will resume the second afternoon unbeaten on 153. England finished the night on 348 for three thanks to the third-wicket stand of 248 with his successor as captain, Root, who struck a frictionless 136.

On Root’s 13 Test hundred, which began from a position of 39 for two in the eighth over, Cook said: “He just makes it look so easy. It’s incredible how he managed to score like he does and if he’s not the best the England player I have played then he is right up there – but I think he is.

READ MORE: Broad confident of maintaining Anderson partnership until after Ashes

“It’s fairly frustrating when you have a [22-run] head start on him and he beats you to a hundred by 20. His game is phenomenal. A genius, whatever, he’s just an unbelievable player to watch from the other end and the way he moves, his rhythm, it’s a lesson to us all.”

Root’s opposite number, Jason Holder, pulled with cramp midway through the 81st over – having initially eschewed the second new ball to the bafflement of the crowd – to sum up a hapless day for the tourists, with only Kemar Roach, who claimed two for 72, threatening.

This was perhaps why Cook rated the 88 he made against South Africa under overcast skies at The Oval as more satisfying, even if he became the fourth England batsman after Len Hutton, Wally Hammond and Kevin Pietersen to go past the 150 mark for a record 10th time.

Well set alongside Dawid Malan (28 not out) and with Ben Stokes, Jonny Bairstow and Moeen Ali still to come, Cook said there is a chance to go seriously big on day two. “I have got an opportunity with time left in the game – you can always nick your first one – so it’s up to me whether I can take it.”

On the new day-night format, he said: “I was yawning at 9pm because that’s my bed time. It’s weird, everything is slightly different because you are programmed to white kit starting at 11am. But it’s a mental thing.

“The jury will be out on the pink ball until we’re two or three years down the line. It’s my second experience [this summer] and it was good.”