I have achieved more than I could have ever imagined and feel very privileged to have played for such a long time alongside some of the greats of the English game.
— Alastair Cook
I do feel sorry for my younger brother, he used to field a lot.
It does take a lot of effort to perform, playing for England. It's a huge amount of sacrifice to do and one day I might just wake up and say 'you know what, I'm done with it.'
If I was a second-team player, I probably would have gone to uni.
I like being outside and I like hard work.
The family farm plays such a big part in my life and I genuinely love going back there. In some ways I'd like to spend every day there, but there would be a big hole in my life if I didn't stay involved in cricket.
I think I come back to Essex and fit in pretty well but until you get there you don't know.
When I'm away from cricket I switch off totally. Otherwise I would never be able to keep that same hunger.
There's nothing worse than going out without contributing.
When I was made captain, one of my things was that whatever happens in those four years, you don't want to make major changes just before a World Cup. We'd done it before, and it never worked.
I miss being the focal point of the team - the guy everyone looks to for decisions. And guidance.
Learning on the job as England captain is hard.
Franchise cricket is here to stay because of the money.
Am I happiest on the farm or out in the middle? I am a cricketer, but the farm is a very special place and I absolutely love being in the countryside and getting away from the bubble. I like to think I'm a farmer, but there's so much experience that goes into that.
From a purely selfish, batting point of view, I couldn't bat any better than the 2010-11 Ashes and then in India in 2012. That was as good as I could play.
In international cricket you have to thrive on the big stage, you have to deal with the media and the pressure.
When I watch Twenty20 cricket, there's a different satisfaction. That hundred you get in six hours is a very satisfying feeling. A real triumph of skill. I don't quite see that in the 20-over game - or the 100-ball game.
Even when every Tom, Dick and Harry was calling for my head, I still felt I could get better at being captain.
It's quite nice to switch off and not see anything to do with cricket.
Yes, there are absolutely moments when you're running out of ideas, and you do genuinely feel sorry for the bowlers when you keep asking them to run in again on a flat wicket, when partnerships get away from you, especially at the tail, which is one of the big differences in the modern game.
You're only England captain for a very short space of time.
The India series wasn't the only reason I retired. It was the culmination of 18 months where things had probably changed in my life.
Jonathan Agnew is a good person to learn off because he's a brilliant broadcaster and the calmness and clarity with which he does things is a real skill.
You're always under pressure, that's what life is about. That is what playing international cricket or being a professional sportsman is.
It's very hard to reflect properly when you're still playing but the hundreds one - when I got my 23rd in Kolkata - felt the most special because it broke a benchmark that had stood for a very long time. It felt good to do something no Englishman has done before.
When you're playing, every ball seems like the biggest event. When you're sitting back, you can see the overall picture better.
Parenthood changes things a lot.
Everyone has technical flaws - no matter how many runs you score.
I was never going to be the best player the world has ever seen but one thing I can be proud of is that I genuinely believe I have become the best player that I could have become.
All I ever wanted to do was play cricket for England and be successful.
Just because you're made England captain, it doesn't mean that you suddenly know everything about captaincy.
The delight you feel in that split second you score your first hundred is so intense it can't be repeated.
If someone taps me on the shoulder and tells me they don't want me to open the batting for England, it's going to hurt.
Sport is an entertainment, in one sense. But it's also a business.
You have to be very pragmatic, because you walk out to bat at the best time to bowl, with a brand new ball, against the best bowlers, who are fresh. And their job is to get you out, so when you fail there's no point beating yourself up.
You're either singing on TV or in front of a full cathedral and there's a bit of pressure there. I know it sounds funny but if you get used to doing it, then performing in front of people playing cricket is the same sort of thing.
The one thing about professional sport is it's all about results, and at the end of the day, if someone is employing you and you're not scoring runs or you're not taking wickets, they ain't going to carry on doing it, and there's no any other way of saying that; that's unfortunately the ruthless business of professional sport.
I've got that ruthlessness inside me. All good captains have to be able to say things like that - with good man-management skills.
Without sounding arrogant, I achieved a lot more than I thought I would do.
You're there to score runs. If you don't do that over a period of time, people will look elsewhere. That hasn't changed and that'll never change, whether it's myself or Jimmy Anderson, you've got to play to a certain level to be picked for England or even Essex.
In a normal series you can have a couple of bad games and still win it.
I think a lot when I'm on my own - and much of it is about cricket.
I always found one-day cricket a lot harder. I had to change my game.
Being a dad is best thing you can do, it's very exciting.
Throughout my career I have done it my way and used my stubborn streak. I thought the best way to captain was to shut out all the noise - I did it with my batting and thought 'that has served me well, so why change it?'
As cricketers we're judged on the average we have from being a 21-year-old who's just come into international cricket to the day you retire.
As cricketers we fail all the time. You score a hundred every now and again but you get out between nought and 20 far more often. If you get 50, you feel bad because you should have got a hundred. Even if you get a hundred, you feel you should have got 150. So you're always failing.
I suppose you could say I was always having to defend my style of captaincy. I did get a lot of criticism - some of it justified, other times as part of a tactic.
Physically and mentally, it's quite hard. But I'm playing cricket for England. It's what I dream about doing.
If you play 100-odd Test matches, there's going to be little periods when you don't score runs, and I've always managed to turn it around.
