Eoin Morgan: England one-day captain missed selector's calls

Eoin Morgan has scored six centuries 123 ODI innings

Eoin Morgan says he had "20 missed calls" from national selector James Whitaker, who was trying to offer him the role of England one-day captain.

The 28-year-old was appointed as Alastair Cook's replacement on Saturday, following England's recent 5-2 series defeat against Sri Lanka.

The Middlesex batsman said: "I thought I better give him a ring and he said 'we'd like to offer you the captaincy'.

"I was delighted to be asked. Being offered the captaincy is awesome."

He continued: "It's a huge honour to lead an extremely talented group of guys during a really exciting period."

Dublin-born Morgan made his one-day international debut for his native Ireland in 2006, but switched to represent England three years later.

Morgan has captained England in eight one-day international matches, most recently in the fourth one-day international in Colombo on 7 December, which ended in defeat for England.

The then stand-in captain was fined 20% of his match fee for a slow over-rate.

The left-hander averages 71.16 with the bat as captain and has led the side to three victories, four defeats and one no-result.

England face Australia and India in a World Cup warm-up one-day series before the start of the 2015 tournament which is being jointly held by Australia and New Zealand.

England begin their World Cup campaign against Australia on 14 February at the MCG in Melbourne.