Neil Warnock: I feel for captain Alastair Cook - being in charge of the England cricket team is so much harder than wearing the armband in football

Hodgson will know you need the right personalities if you’re away a long time

England captain Alastair Cook will need plenty of support from coach Andy Flower out in Australia (Getty Images)

Don’t tell the Aussie papers, but I’ve been cheating at the cricket. I simply don’t have the stamina to stay up all night, especially with two 6am starts a week for TalkSPORT, so after watching for a bit I record it and watch the following day, often fast-forwarding between balls.

It has been absorbing to follow. I’m always fascinated by how people manage players in other sports and especially so in cricket, partly because I really enjoy the game, but also because in cricket the captain is in many respects the manager as well. That makes it a really tough job. The principles of management are the same whatever the sport. You have to be strong, positive and in control, but in football your influence is limited once the game starts, then you are dependent on your players, and how much they have taken on board the work you have done with them beforehand.

Being a cricket captain is different because you go on to the pitch with them. That means you can influence events more, but you have your own performance to worry about as well and that can be difficult, especially if you are a batsman, as most cricket captains seem to be. In football, when the captain makes a bad pass or mistake, he knows it is just one incident of the many he will be involved in over 90 minutes. In cricket, if you make a mistake at the crease that can be it for a couple of days. And you know the press are waiting to jump on you and the opposition will target you. It’s no wonder they all get burnt up by the job in the end.

Touring a place like Australia, where everybody is trying to unsettle you and find some advantage they can use against you, is tough. I don’t think anyone appreciates the pressure these lads are under Down Under. I wouldn’t be surprised if they have fire alarms going off in hotels in the middle of the night. It happens. I can recall at least three occasions I’ve been stood outside a hotel in my pyjamas at three in the morning with my players yawning alongside. One of them was before a promotion play-off away leg. Each time the hotel looked into it and there was no evidence of any incident that might have triggered a fire alarm.

You also get opposition fans – and media – calling players in their rooms late at night. About nine years ago I started blocking calls after about 10 o’clock. I’d be woken up by the phone at midnight and there’d be no one at the other end. I even told players’ families they had to ring a member of staff – usually the physio – if they had a message they wanted to get through. Of course, with everyone having a mobile families now ring direct, but fans can’t so we still blocked calls.

Families can themselves be a distraction. With a long cricket tour I think it’s OK for them to fly out and spend a bit of time with the players, but you don’t want them becoming an issue, like the Wags have been at football World Cups. You don’t want young babies disturbing players’ sleep, either. If players have very young children they really need to have their own room.

It was interesting following the Ashes build-up, with Shane Warne slaughtering Alastair Cook’s captaincy. I do believe Cook is a cool cookie – excuse the pun – and I think he will take it in his stride, but he will want to score runs; that will make everything so much easier. It is when things get tough for him and the team that I think Andy Flower is important for Cook. I see his role generally as more the equivalent of an assistant manager in football in terms of what he does around the team. But he is also like the chairman who, in football, is the man who, in my experience, is the one who lifts the manager when things aren’t going well. At some stage everyone needs a lift.

Cook’s task on tour is even harder because, with Flower’s help, he also has to manage his team off the field – and that can be more difficult than looking after the players on it, especially if results are not going well. There is a lot of time in hotels, the press are looking for any mischief, and there will be players who are out of the team to keep on board. Even if they are good pros you have to keep your eye on them as the temptation, if you are not playing, is to go off course.

I’ve not been away with a team more than a week or two and that’s been pre-season, when there is less at stake, but it doesn’t take long for a bad influence to be a problem. During the season we’d sometimes stay away for four or five days if a team I was managing had back-to-back games at the other end of the country. One time was at QPR, in our promotion season, when we had two Championship games in the North. We lost the first one, at Scunthorpe, badly, and on the bus to Barnsley for the second all I could hear was Pascal Chimbonda saying, “Where are we going out? Why aren’t we going back to London?” He knew I could hear him and we both knew he wasn’t in the starting XI. I decided not to make a song and dance about it on the bus, but even before we’d arrived at the hotel I’d told one of the staff he’d be taking Pascal to the station and putting him on a train to London the following morning.

I spoke to Pascal a few weeks ago when we had him on talkSPORT. He’s playing for Carlisle now, under Graham Kavanagh, which I must admit has surprised me and does him credit. I did ask him if he was still wearing a hat and gloves at training as Curly [my QPR coach Keith Curle] used to hate the fact he wore them in the warm-up and wouldn’t take them off. He wanted attention, so I introduced a rule: no one except Pascal could wear them at training. If he thought QPR was cold I bet he’s wearing them now, in Carlisle.

You do need the right personalities when you’re away a long time and I’m sure that’s something Roy Hodgson will consider when he picks his World Cup squad. There will be some players who won’t play much; you don’t want them to be the type that might cause problems.

Goodison not the same as climbing for FA Cup view

I’m looking forward to Everton v Liverpool at lunchtime today which I am covering for BT Sport. It’s Roberto Martinez’s first derby with Everton but I’m sure the players will have told him what it means to the city. It’s a toss of a coin who wins and much will depend on how Sylvain Distin and Phil Jagielka deal with Luis Suarez and Daniel Sturridge.

The game is a contrast to the last one I covered, Shortwood v Port Vale in the FA Cup. I was co-commentator and to get to my seat in the temporary scaffolding I had to climb up one of the highest ladders I’ve ever been on. Halfway up I was thinking, “What am I doing up here at my age?” but it was a great view once I got up there and I enjoyed the evening. It was a real throwback. The main stand had about 50 seats and there was a single track into the ground. Even Port Vale’s players had to get off their bus and take a minibus into the ground.

Ronaldo’s simply the best now

I started watching England on Tuesday, but I wasn’t enjoying it so I switched over to Sweden-Portugal and I was quickly hooked. What a match that was. The quality of Cristiano Ronaldo’s finishing was amazing. Lionel Messi’s brilliant, but there’s no one better than Ronaldo at the moment.