Ben Stokes cop-out divides opinion after England’s Ashes failure

Amid the doldrums of continued Ashes failure, Ben Stokes has delivered one comment about his team’s performance that fans aren’t copping.

COMMENT
In an era of PR-massaged responses for professional sporting teams losing, doubling down is a rare one.

While Australian football codes are partial to a blunt “not our day today”, the English response to England’s failure to wrest back the urn this series has been to allow its cricketers to express themselves, and with it, we have seen the shortcomings of Bazball’s declared multi-pronged social mission.

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After England’s heartbreaking loss in the first Test at Edgbaston, captain Ben Stokes insisted England were “not a results-driven team”, and that he was “proud” of the manner in which his team had “(taken) the game on from ball one”.

“If that’s not attracting people to the game we love, then I don’t know what will,” Stokes said after play at Edgbaston.

After a draw at Old Trafford saw England’s chances of winning back the Ashes slip away, Stokes doubled down on this Edgbaston remarks, insisting that there were “bigger things for (England) than winning the Ashes.”

“As much as I would love to be an Ashes-winning captain, I want this team to be a legacy team. I think regardless of what happens over the next period, these 18 months will always go down in history as one of the most exciting and proactive teams to ever walk out there and represent England,” he told the BBC.

Stokes insisted that there’s bigger things than winning the Ashes after Old Trafford. (Photo by Clive Mason/Getty Images)

Stokes’ comments have inspired mixed reactions, with BBC broadcaster Alison Mitchell reading it as “a way of taking pressure off”.

England Women fast bowling coach Matt Mason echoed Stokes’ sentiments.

“Sport can’t just be about winning and I believe that England are doing far more for the game than the results will determine,” Mason said.

“Inspiring so many youngsters to take up the game and entertaining so many people like only sport can.

“Spreading happiness and pride when they play.”

The idea that a relatively simple concept of playing Test cricket more aggressively, as if it wasn’t a cornerstone of some of the great Test sides of history, has such a hold over the imaginations of schoolchildren across the motherland that it will inspire a resurgence in participation and eyeballs is as fascinating as it is misguided.

With the biggest boosts to the game in England coming from key events like the 2019 World Cup win and 2005 Ashes victory, it’s clear that the public are attracted to winning teams, and being able to watch them on free-to-air television.

England captain Ben Stokes encourages his team during day four. (Photo by Stu Forster/Getty Images)

This is reflected in many of the fan responses to Stokes’ remarks.

Ex-journalist Tom Banner insisted that teams weren’t remembered by their style of play, but by their results.

“Does anyone remember the way Ashes-winning teams played 50 years ago? No,” Banner said.

“The tangible scoreline is how they’re remembered.”

Former financial journalist Ian Johnson said “(Stokes) has taken the pressure off by not caring if we win or lose as long as his mates get a game and they enjoy themselves.”

Broadcaster David Lithgow described England’s approach as “arrogant lunacy”.

Another fan said “I really don’t like this Messianic stuff from Stokes. The best way to make his team a ‘legacy team’ would have been to win the Ashes.”
The idea that Bazball has social importance beyond that of its utility as a cricketing philosophy, particularly when that cricketing philosophy has proven limited over the course of the series thus far, has been criticised as well.

The Guardian’s Jonathan Liew wrote after the Lord’s Test that “England’s men of Bazball are putting fun before winning. Why not try both?”

“The men of Bazball do not trouble themselves with details,” he wrote in an acerbic op-ed.

“Could they have lost their wickets in even more perplexing ways? Could they have thrilled us even more? When cornered, don’t back down. Double down.”

Liew lamented that the “cult of Bazball”, coined by fellow Guardian writer Barney Ronay, meant that the English men’s team have become immune from criticism.

Stokes’ approach this series has been criticised as “a self-protective cowardice masquerading as bravery.” (Photo by Oli SCARFF / AFP)

“There is a school of thought out there that if you appreciated England’s style of cricket when they were winning, then it is unfair to criticise it when it fails to come off,” he said.

“This is a little bit like arguing that if you have ever enjoyed a meal at a restaurant, you are not entitled to complain when they give you E. coli on your next visit. It’s just the way they cook. They’re taking a whole new approach to gastronomy. And ultimately, when you get down to it, is there really any difference between fine dining and violent diarrhoea?”

Stokes has long forged his team in the image of social saviours for a sport that has long been crippled under the weight of unfavourable broadcast arrangements, overstuffed schedules and lagging grassroots participation particularly amongst lower socio-economic stratas and minorities, but in the process has lost sight of what would truly reinvigorate English cricket – Ashes victory on home soil.

Instead, what we see is what is described by Liew as “a kind of nihilism, a self-protective cowardice masquerading as bravery.”

In looking beyond the cricket for perspective, it appears that Stokes’ men possibly have lost sight of the importance of cricket to the very people they hope to bring with them on their noble quest, and have subsequently refused to adapt to what is required of them as Test cricketers.

As Ricky Ponting pointed out after the events of Old Trafford, Stokes’ inflexibility in the face of adversity has cost his side over the course of the series, and now they head to the Oval, where they are staring down the barrel of home Ashes defeat for the first time in two generations.

A legacy indeed.