RECORD-BREAKING Alastair Cook will go down as one of English cricket’s greatest-ever batsmen, according to his Essex team-mate Graham Napier.

Cook became the youngest player in history and the first Englishman to reach 10,000 Test Match runs, after the former Maldon Cricket Club youngster reached the magnificent milestone in his side’s Second Test victory over Sri Lanka, at Chester-le-Street.

At 31 years and 157 days, Cook beat Sachin Tendulkar’s record to achieve the milestone and England’s all-time leading Test run-scorer still has an outside chance of overhauling the Indian maestro’s record of 15,921 Test runs.

Colchester-born Napier knows Cook very well, having played alongside him at Essex since the England captain rose through the club’s academy and made his First Class debut for the county, in 2003.

Napier believes Cook, who joins 11 other batsmen in the 10,000-run club, will go down in history as one of the game’s best-ever players.

Napier told the Daily Gazette: “Every innings that Cookie plays now, he seems to break another record.

“Statistically, he’s now one of the greatest batsmen English cricket has ever had, if not the greatest.

“But the big thing is that you wouldn’t know if you spoke to him and he’s such a humble guy.

“Although he is undoubtedly driven to break records, the nice thing about Cookie is that he just wants to go out and bat and score runs.”

Meanwhile, Napier says the new coin toss rule introduced in this season’s County Championship is contributing to more runs being scored.

The captain of the visiting side is now given the option of bowling first – with the usual coin toss taking place if they decide not to – in a bid to encourage better pitches in the four-day game and Essex have started their new division two campaign well so far.

Napier said: “The style of cricket that we’re playing and the change in conditions we are playing under has been excellent, in terms of the way that cricket is being played.

“The new toss of the coin rule has made all pitches more batsman friendly and has made for some fantastic games so far.

“We’ve set our stall out to try and score as many runs as we could and that’s what we’ve been doing.

“It’s a nice feeling in the camp and we’ve been enjoying our cricket.

“The team are top of the table which is what we set out to do at the beginning of the season and it’s always a nice position to be in.”