A compact left-hander with a preference for pummelling the ball square off the back foot with a crunching cut, Andrew Strauss has worked out a superb technique for Test cricket. He put early problems against Shane Warne behind him to make two hundreds in the epic 2005 Ashes series, and added another big one (161) in 2009 to set up England's first victory over the old enemy at Lord's since 1934. Mike Atherton and Alec Stewart, by contrast, only ever managed one century apiece against Australia.

Calm and urbane, Strauss put the disappointment of being passed over as England's captain for the 2006-07 Ashes series - probably a godsend, as it turned out, as even Doctor Who would have had trouble with those rampant whitewash-bound Aussies - to bounce back in 2009 and orchestrate the recapture of the urn. The following year, he joined the elite of English cricket by leading a successful Ashes defence in Australia, triumphing 3-1 to end a 24-year wait for victory Down Under.

Strauss's early county cricket with Middlesex did not exactly suggest a star in the making, but a century in 2003 against Lancashire, with Andrew Flintoff charging in, set the selectors sniffing - and also made Strauss believe he had what it took. After a few one-day caps that winter Strauss was called up for the first Test against New Zealand in 2004 after Michael Vaughan twisted his knee in the Lord's nets. Strauss responded with a confident century, and was unlucky to miss another one in the second innings when Nasser Hussain ran him out 17 short. But Hussain had seen enough: with Vaughan set to return, he announced his immediate retirement, confident that Strauss was the real deal.

Strauss has been emphasising that almost ever since, responding to being dropped from the one-day team by upping his strike-rate, and probably saving his Test career after a poor run with an eight-hour 177 in a series-clinching victory over New Zealand early in 2008. That century had been a long time coming: after ten tons in his first 30 Tests, Strauss did not reach three figures in his next 15 games - and the knives were well and truly out when he fell for a duck, driving loosely, in the first innings of that Napier match.

After an early flirtation with captaincy in 2006 - he memorably dubbed himself "the stand-in for the stand-in" in the absence of the injured Vaughan and Flintoff - Strauss inherited the armband again early in 2009, after the messy sacking of Kevin Pietersen and coach Peter Moores. It was not a good way to start - and when England were bowled out for 51 in Jamaica to lose his first match in permanent charge, it looked like he had picked up the ultimate poisoned chalice.

However, in partnership with the meticulous and inscrutable Andy Flower, Strauss set about rebuilding England's reputation, leading from the front with the bat and moulding a squad of players who look capable of becoming the No. 1 side in the world.
Steven Lynch

• July 27, 1997
  A Sunday League debut
  • After spending the summer of 1996 with Durham University and Middlesex's second XI, Strauss's first appearance for the county's first XI comes the following year in an Axa Sunday League game against Kent at Lord's. It is an unpromising debut as, batting at No. 8, he contributes only three runs before being bowled by Matthew Fleming.
    
• August 31, 1998
  An impressive first-class start
  • At the age of 21, Strauss's first opportunity in the county championship comes in Middlesex's game against Hampshire, when, given a chance up the order, he makes 83 in the first innings before edging Nixon McLean, the West Indies fast bowler, to second slip. He fails in the second innings, however, scoring 12 before the declaration in a match that Hampshire go on to win by 7 wickets.
    
• May 6, 2000
  Foreshadowing an opening role
  • Strauss had switched to the position of opener the previous summer with reasonable success, and gets his maiden first-class hundred in that position when he makes 111 not out in the second innings of a drawn game against Northamptonshire. His sole century of the summer is a timely one, coming in Middlesex's first game of the championship season. Its setting - Lord's - is a special one too, and the ground would come to hold several fond memories for Strauss in the years that follow.
    
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• May 11, 2002
  Captaincy by default
  • After Angus Fraser's surprise retirement, Strauss captains Middlesex for the first time against the touring Sri Lankans. It is an unassuming beginning to his captaincy in a drawn game, but a significant moment in Strauss's career, if not altogether unexpected. He had led the ECB National Academy - a squad containing Ian Bell, Andrew Flintoff and Steve Harmison - on a number of occasions during their tour to Australia in 2001-02.
    
• April to September, 2002
  Beginning to blossom
  • Strauss, Middlesex's new captain at 25, comes of age as a batsman scoring 1133 first class runs - with almost 1000 coming in the County Championship - at an average of 47.20, including three hundreds and five half-centuries. In a reasonably successful season, Middlesex finish second in the second division of the Championship, although one-day honours prove rather harder to come by.
    
• September 10, 2003
  Nudging the selectors
  • As a reward for a fruitful county season in which he scores 1401 first-class runs at 51.88, Strauss, 26, is named in the one-day squad to tour Bangladesh and Sri Lanka in the winter. He is already being spoken about as being an outsider to become Michael Vaughan's eventual successor as captain.
    
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• November 18, 2003
  When good debuts turn bad
  • After staking a claim with a brace of fluent half-centuries in warm-up games against a Bangladesh Cricket Board development XI and a Sri Lanka Cricket President's XI, Strauss usurps a struggling Vikram Solanki at the top of the order to make his full England debut in the first one-day international against Sri Lanka at Dambulla. What should have been a happy event quickly turns into a nightmare, however, as England are rolled over for a paltry 88 - their lowest one-day score overseas - with Strauss contributing just three runs, before Sanath Jayasuriya and Romesh Kaluwitharana sprint to a 10-wicket victory in the 14th over.
    
• March 5, 2004
  Test honours beckon
  • A few days after his 27th birthday, Strauss, who had been due to arrive with the England one-day team in April, is called up to England's Test squad in the Caribbean as cover for Mark Butcher, who injured his ankle in the first match of the tour, and Graham Thorpe, who suffered a recurrence of a niggling back injury. In the event, both recovered in time for the Tests but Strauss's reputation continued to grow in the one-day series which followed, as he registered successive fifties in sixth and seventh games at Gros Islet and Bridgetown.
    
• May 22, 2004
  Waltzing to a debut hundred
  • Called up two days before the first Test against New Zealand after Michael Vaughan had twisted his knee in the nets, Strauss makes a dream debut as he becomes the fourth player - and the first Middlesex captain - to score a century at Lord's on his Test debut. The only blip in his silky 112 is a nervous patch as he enters the 90s, and he looks set for a hundred in the second innings too, before he is run out by Nasser Hussain, the man he had been tipped to replace in the Test side.
    
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• July 6, 2004
  More Lord's magic
  • It is at Lord's, once again, that Strauss reaches his first hundred in one-day internationals. He adds 226 with Andrew Flintoff - a record one-day stand for England - to rescue his team from a perilous 54 for 3 and goes on to reach a round 100 before picking out Dwayne Bravo at deep midwicket. His efforts are in vain, however, as West Indies chase down their target in the final over courtesy of Chris Gayle's unbeaten 132 to knock England out of the NatWest series.
    
• May to September 2004
  Making hay while the sun shines
  • Strauss enjoys a prolific summer, making 273 runs in three Tests against New Zealand at 45.50, and 317 runs in four Tests against West Indies at 45.28 to go with 256 runs in five NatWest series games, with yet another hundred at Lord's, and 102 runs during the Champions Trophy...
    
• December 2004 to February 2005
  A fruitful safari
  • ...but that was just the warm-up, as Strauss really gets going on England's tour of Southern Africa. He singlehandedly wins the first Test against South Africa at Port Elizabeth with scores of 126 and 94 not out in the second innings run-chase. He goes on to add another hundred in the second Test at Kingsmead, and another as England seal the series in the fourth Test at the Wanderers. In a remarkable series, he tops the batting charts with 656 runs at 72.88.
    
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• July to September 2005
  A part in history-making
  • Strauss's two hundreds of the Ashes summer, in the tense third Test at Old Trafford and the drawn fifth Test at The Oval ensure that he plays an important part in England's first Ashes victory in 18 years.
    
• May to September 2006
  Captain-in-waiting gets his chance
  • After cutting his teeth in the role in the India series, Strauss captains England for the first time at home by default after both Michael Vaughan and Andrew Flintoff are ruled out with injuries. He starts with a traumatic 5-0 whitewash against Sri Lanka in the one-day series, but begins to settle into the role in the first Test of the series against Pakistan which followed with another Test hundred at Lord's, although the series is ultimately overshadowed by the ball-tampering row in the fourth Test at The Oval.
    
• October 2006 to January 2007
  Ashes ignominy
  • With Andrew Flintoff back at the helm, England head to Australia to begin their Ashes defence after a largely forgettable performance at the Champions Trophy. In the midst of England's five-nil drubbing, Strauss suffers a dramatic loss of form, reaching fifty just once in the series and stumbling to 247 runs in 10 innings. His returns in the CB series which followed are equally disappointing.
    
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• March to April 2007
  An unhappy World Cup
  • After initially, and justifiably, losing his place at the top of the order at the World Cup, Strauss eventually regains the opening slot but struggles to make an impact at a disappointing tournament for England with a return of 46 runs from four innings.
    
• May to August 2007
  More struggles
  • Although he returns to some semblance of form against the West Indies with his 77 at Durham, Strauss has a shocker of a series against arguably the weakest bowling attack he had faced in his three-year career. He is the only member of England's top seven to miss out on three figures, as his footwork goes awry and with it his judgment against off-stump deliveries. Strauss captains a strong England Lions side against the touring Indians, but his inconsistent form continues in the Test series which follows. Although he narrowly misses out on a hundred in the first Test at Lord's, Strauss himself admitts it "wasn't a free-flowing innings by any means".
    
• October 2007 to January 2008
  Missing out... briefly
  • After struggling with his form for 18 months, Strauss is left out of England's Test squad for the tour to Sri Lanka. His return to the side is swift, however, as he is recalled for the New Zealand trip early in 2008 despite having no chance to show his form.
    
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• March 2008
  Catharsis
  • After a century in the warm up game against the Major Association XI at Dunedin, Strauss struggles in the first and second Tests, falling to horribly weak strokes to leave his England future in serious jeopardy going into the final Test in Napier. He responds to the challenge in the most emphatic way possible, scoring a cathartic 177 to reinvigorate his career.
    
• January 2009
  The England captaincy
  • Strauss, 31, is formally unveiled as England's Test captain at a packed press conference at Lord's, after a tumultuous 24 hours for English cricket surrounding the double departure of Kevin Pietersen and the coach Peter Moores. He is not, however, named England's one-day captain, a decision that Strauss admits is still in "a state of flux".
    
• February to March 2009
  A shocker at Sabina Park
  • England, still fractured after the Pietersen-Moores spat, are bowled out for 51 to lose the first Test of Strauss's reign by an innings at Sabina Park. Despite three big hundreds from him in the third, fourth, and fifth Tests, England suffer an unexpected series defeat.
    
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• July to August 2009
  Ashes glory
  • After finding some joy with a 2-0 series win over an uninspired West Indies in May, Strauss leads England to victory over Australia to regain the Ashes. England's highest run scorer by some distance, his 474 runs at an average of 52.66 prove vital. Strauss's only scores one hundred in the series, but seizes the momentum at a key moment when does so with a rousing 161 on the first day at Lord's to inspire a 115-run victory. Further half-centuries follow at Edgbaston and The Oval as England wrap up a 2-1 series win.
    
• November 2009 to January 2010
  A unifying force
  • Strauss suffers a rare dip in form on England's tour of South Africa, scoring just 72 runs in the ODIs series and 170 in the Tests, being visibly ruffled by Morne Morne's round-the-wicket line, which accounts for three of his seven dismissals in the Test series. But he excels as a leader on a long, arduous tour, rallying England to victory in the one-day series and holding South Africa to a drawn Test series.
    
• February 2010
  Taking a break
  • After the South Africa tour, Strauss decides to opt out of England's trip to Bangladesh, explaining that he is fatigued and jaded after a year of almost non-stop touring. He explains that the decision to take a rest is an effort to save himself from burn-out during a busy 18-month period which includes the Ashes series and the World Cup.
    
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• January 2011
  The Ashes retained
  • Strauss joins an elite band of England captains to have won Ashes series at home and away with his triumphant campaign in the winter of 2010-11. The trip started traumatically with a third-ball duck in the first over of the series at Brisbane, but Strauss's steely second-innings hundred would become the first of nine England centuries in a run-laden tour.
    
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