Captain Clarke looks to gaining respect by scoring runs

Former Australian captain Ricky Ponting's successor Michael Clarke feels his main challenge is to earn respect from his team mates and to lead from the front by scoring runs.

Clarke, who started his captaincy with a 3-0 win in a one-day series in Bangladesh, believes that he is respected within the team as an established international player but to have the same as a leader, he needs to have runs and major series-wins under his belt.

The right-hand batsman was battling with poor form during the team's unsuccessful Ashes campaign but regained touch in the subsequent ODI series against England and since then has been amongst the runs. Clarke scored a hundred against Bangladesh in his first match as captain.


'I certainly feel like I have got the support and respect as a player because I've played a lot of international cricket. For me it's now about gaining that respect as a captain and a leader and I guess the first and foremost way to do that is to have some success on the field, to get some wins,' Clarke was quoted as saying by ESPNcricinfo.

'I don't really know how the players feel, I guess they would be happy because we got the result (in Bangladesh), we won and for me I didn't want to change too many things straight away, it was about coming here, training hard, preparing well and playing some good cricket on the filed. Now I have got this break to assess things, speak to the right people and get some guidance and some help, and assess where we are at,' he said. Australia's next international assignment is in July.

Clarke, referring to Ponting's advice, said it is important to score runs as captain.

'I think it is important to lead from the front, no doubt.

'Probably one of the things Ricky has taught me is that as a leader, as a senior player and certainly as the captain, you need to be standing up with the bat as a batsman, you need to be scoring runs. For me that's a big part of this team going forward, I am now the captain and I want to stand up and make sure I am leading from the front,' he added.