'My confidence is growing' - Pope on captaincy & batting at three

England's Ollie Pope insisted on one thing being crystal clear for the Surrey team he was about to lead into T20 Blast action.

"I said ‘look lads, this is my first time doing this. If you feel like I’ve got something wrong, just come to me. I don’t care if you say I had a terrible game as captain – come to me. I’d rather that than you bitch about me behind my back for a day or two’.

"And that’s what everyone did,” Pope tells BBC Sport. “If they wanted to talk about anything, I was sweet. I was open, if I did get it wrong, to guys coming up, because I’m learning on the job."

Pope's straight-talking approach speaks to many of his best qualities. It speaks to his humility. Here was England’s Test vice-captain, a shoo-in at first drop and, likely, Ben Stokes’ successor, returning to a county dressing room – albeit his county – and requesting a little help.

It speaks to his personal development. And it speaks to his perceptiveness and innate ability to take a room’s temperature.

"I've been part of changing rooms where guys have got frustrated - not necessarily now, but previously," says Pope.

"You lose a few games, guys start talking, and suddenly they are getting frustrated at people within the leadership group. I know that just makes things worse and worse, and things fester. I think a team where you can openly criticise and give each other feedback will be more successful in the long run."

At 26, Pope is an assured speaker and an ability to mentally multi-task is a key reason Surrey turned to him in Chris Jordan’s World T20-enforced absence.

"Everything happens so quickly," Pope says, but the fact that he is an equally "quick learner" helped.

"It was good for me to practise speaking a lot more to the group after the game.”

Stokes anointed Pope his deputy just over 12 months back. The role did not surprise Pope, but that was only because he had been asked to fill in as skipper during the pre-2023 Ashes warm-ups in Abu Dhabi.

“I didn’t view myself as a vice-captain, but I realised it was time for me to be a bit more of a leader within this group," says Pope.

Pope’s Ashes summer was curtailed by right shoulder surgery, having fallen awkwardly during the Lord’s Test. But upon returning for the New Year India tour, observers remarked that Pope’s demeanour had changed.

He was more comfortable addressing the team before play, and, during the Hyderabad Test, gave Jasprit Bumrah a snarl – or at least as close to one as the affable Pope gets – when the India bowler deliberately blocked his running path.

"My confidence is growing," Pope says. "That comes through a bit of experience as well and confidence cementing my place in the team.

"I am enjoying having the responsibilities on my back and I am paying a little more attention than in the past."

A shift up the order to three has arguably been the catalyst for Pope’s personal growth spurt. Since first occupying the position in June 2022, Pope has made more than half of his 2,508 Test runs, averaging 42.20, there, compared with 34.35 across his 44 matches. His strike-rate is a dozen higher at 74.27 too.

The move came at his own request. In his three Tests during England’s torrid 2021-22 Ashes tour, Pope averaged just 11.17. That March he carried drinks in the West Indies.

Before the summer’s New Zealand series, Surrey had a four-day game coming up.

"I knew selection was coming up but didn't know if I was going to get the call,” Pope explains.

"I saw Joe Root was going back to number four so in my mind, for the first time in my career, I thought ‘I feel like a number three’."

Pope enthusiastically floated the idea with Stokes.

"And he said, ‘oh no, don't worry about it. You just focus on scoring your own runs.’ I’m thinking ‘that’s not a good sign’ – I thought it meant I wouldn’t be in the squad."

Pope made his runs, notching up 417 in six innings, batting at four.

"The way Ben dealt with it was great," he says. "There’s potentially only one ball's difference between three and four. I don’t know if it’s made a difference but I was happy I made that call."

While international sport is no place for complacency, it would take something meteoric to dislodge him in the immediate future. His 196 set up England’s opening Test triumph during their otherwise gruelling India trip this winter.

Pope’s form, like England’s, tailed off and he made just 95 runs across the remaining four Tests.

“It’s a hard one to describe,” says Pope, who called the innings "a special memory".

“You get back from that tour and there are so many negative comments in the media, I felt, towards me and towards the team, which is completely fine, I underperformed in those games.

“People’s opinions change very quickly. We are international cricketers - it’s tough to go and perform every game, but it’s not always as easy as people imagine."

Pope’s next aim is to earn an England white-ball cap. He travelled with the one-day international squad to the West Indies in December but, for a second consecutive Caribbean jaunt, spent match-days in a bib.

It is, though, easy to forget that Pope made his name as a T20 dasher.

"I think I could hit a scoop and a reverse scoop when I started - that was about it," Pope says.

"I feel like I’ve added a bit more to my game now, and the way we’re playing as a Test side will help me."

He hopes his T20 form – he made 99 for Surrey against Sussex – and a strong Test summer will push his case.

"I'd love to try and knock on that door. Test cricket is always going to be a priority. There’s some away series coming up that interlock within Test series, but I definitely wouldn’t want to turn down that opportunity."