I certainly do not want to be remembered as a good captain who perhaps didn't contribute with the bat as much as he might have done.

I think I've broken every finger, and my wrist on a tennis court in Guyana, and at 33 you get other injuries like hernias and tennis elbow.

Some would argue the opposite: that with better pitches you should be able to express yourself, a bit like Kevin Pietersen does. Looking back, I wish I had been a bit more like that. But I always had a fear of failure, a fear of getting out, so I tried to eliminate risk from my game.

With all my bats I like them to be bottom-heavy, so they help me to hold the line through the shot.

One-day cricket is about continuity, team ethic, understanding each other's role, where everybody fields and bats, when and at which end they want to bowl.

As a player you always feel the pressure and as a team you are always trying to make sure the opposition are under it.

Pujara is not fashionable, he's very much old-fashioned - he's not great between the wickets and he's not a modern, extravagant, in-your-face character like Kohli, Dhawan or Pandya.

I admired Stephen Fleming.

There have been a few times in my career when I have been close to tears after completing an innings, but rarely when I am waiting to bat.

Trescothick hates it if somebody starts taking the micky or running other people down - which can happen a lot in some dressing-rooms - and he makes sure he stamps it out.

I admire anyone who can show they can dig deep. Ballesteros and Sergio Garcia, people who are obviously mentally strong. Or Graham Thorpe. He is your fighter. He's the kid who is bullied at school but will stand up in a fight when it matters.

Sometimes we don't build up our own cricketers enough.

In the longer term we have got to learn how to bowl on flat pitches if England are to head the ICC Championship table.

You should not be flat playing for your country.

I played with Graham Thorpe and Alec Stewart; if anything off the field affected Graham his cricket life was not important and you had to give him a break. But if Alec had issues at home you would never know about it; he would turn up and think: 'This is my job, I can do it.'

If you've got an opportunity to improve your squad before a World Cup you must take it.

I think Andrew Strauss never gets enough credit for what he's done for English cricket.

I haven't stuck my head out to be captain of England.

Off the field I always thought Mark Taylor was exemplary in the way he handled himself.

I am still disappointed when I have let myself down or my team. That will not change at any stage in the future.

From the age of eight until 15 or 16, every time I was out bowling leg spin I was thinking about my dad and when you've done that it stays with you. There are lots of things he did which enabled me to be the player that I was. It wasn't me that wanted to be a cricketer. He made me 90 per cent of the player I was and the person I was.

My relationship with my dad is everything.

With my bowling, I didn't know how I was doing it, so when it went wrong I didn't know how to fix it.

Bowling was my natural skill. I didn't know how I was doing it, but I was spinning it miles and bamboozling people.

When you are no longer England captain, you suddenly realise it's over, you are no longer England captain, and you appreciate what you had.

More than playing, my greatest moments and love of the game come from captaining England.

Being in charge of a team is just like having kids.

The closer I got to Essex 2nds, the more technical I got with my batting.

I had good and bad seasons for Essex. I was a real form player: if I got on a run, I was happy and confident, but if I had a bad trot, I was far too analytical of my game, worried about it too much and my form got worse.

When I see people like Pietersen bat, I wish that I'd freed up a bit as a batsman, but it's very easy to say now.

I've played cricket seriously since I was eight years old, when I first played for the Essex under-11s. I can't just turn it off.

I've been married a long time.

I have applied to go to either Durham or Loughborough University to study Applied Physics and would like to get some qualification behind me. But when I do think about becoming professional Essex would be my first choice as I have been very happy playing and practising with them.

I went to Spain with my brother when I was about 17. We stayed near Barcelona and it was terrible. There were floods and I ended up missing my flight home.

I enjoy India whenever I go and Sri Lankans are overwhelmingly friendly.

There are lots of places I would love to go to in Europe and North America.

When you've done as much travelling as I have, it becomes hard work - I probably spend 90 per cent of the year travelling.

At the end of my career I always wanted to look back and know that I had given it my absolute best.

Tiger Woods is someone I'd like to ask questions of. I'm fascinated to know about his life - everything he goes through, is he happy being Tiger Woods?

Whether that was in the Chepauk Stadium in Madras or at the Ilford Cricket School, there was a daily diet of cricket run by my dad. It was a hard school but he knew what he was doing. Everything I achieved was down to my dad.

Sometimes when you're around a side you don't realise how good they are until you go away from home and they are a very fine team.

Many Pakistani fans will say they have followed their team for too long and had their hearts broken many times, but I love them, and I love their cricket.

I think Kohli is magnificent in a run chase, I have to say. He has won so many matches for India.

So for me Tendulkar is the greatest but Kohli is not far behind and could well end up as the greatest.

You have to think about ways of improving the helmet all the time, balancing protection with being able to move and see the ball.

I like back-to-back Tests at the end of a series, without any county game in between. We know county cricket has no bearing on Test cricket.

Patriotism is something I wear in my heart not on my head.

It is crucial to have an injury seen to quickly.

Adam Gilchrist and Ricky Ponting are anything but conventional, and you can't frown on Steve Waugh for playing his slog-sweep because it's so effective.

Everyone should be decisive about what's best for them and stick to it.