BEN STOKES @100
Follow UsThere is a definitive silence around The Park, Hyderabad. It is breakfast time already, just an hour to go for the third day of the first Test at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium. But the large chunk of traveling Barmy Army fans stationed in Nizam City aren’t very hopeful. The dream of conquering India with Bazball seems like a distant idea.
20 minutes of drive later, we’re in Uppal. The non-descript outskirts of Hyderabad is buzzing with Indian fans. More than an Indian victory, with the schadenfreude of seeing Bazball coming to its knees.
But it didn’t. As India found out at the end of Day 4, England reversed the script to secure a 1-0 lead. At the heart of the win was a debutant spinner no one had given a chance ahead of the match and a batter who was backed to the hilt despite no big innings to show for it.
It is imperative to go back to The Park for the evening scene. Everyone just had their money’s worth. It was time to party after witnessing what is a “once-in-a-generation” performance by their side.
“The bloody guy can do anything,” one fan muttered before another went on to add, “The GOAT already.”
It was the kind of day that summed up the second coming of Ben Stokes. A cricketer whose ability to produce magical performances has been celebrated for close to half a decade now, the Ben Stokes that has changed the fulcrum of the game as the skipper of the England Test side, will be remembered with more vigour, even on days he doesn’t have a tangible role to play.
The win was a byproduct of the atmosphere that Stokes and Brendon McCullum have instilled in the team - a fun mindset and remembering why they started playing cricket in the first place. He is an elixir to English cricket’s own idea of rejuvenation. Kevin Pietersen, Eoin Morgan, Stokes - a lineage of superstars to whom English cricket owes a huge debt of gratitude.
That’s why, as Stokes heads into his 100th Test match of his career, it seems all so foggy yet so crystal clear. The player who was initiated into the England Test side in 2013 in the wake of a generation moving away is shaping the very destiny of the format around the world. It is foggy because no one knows how long it will last, but if it can sustain for two long years - as it has almost been for the Bazball - you ought to have done something right.
It is also interesting because no matter how big a legacy he leaves behind as the leader of this English Test side, he will never outclass his legacy as an all-rounder in the format.
At no point in the last five years has a player been more important to the team’s cause than Stokes has been for England. Despite damaging his knee more than a rugby player, Stokes always returns. To provide a sense of liberation to the English cricket fans and a sense of deprivation to the opposition.
Sometimes, the obvious needs to be said because while trying to figure out the quotient between glories and failings, we forget both are flip sides of the very same coin. If Stokes's career followed an almost narcissistic path in the first few years, culminating with a brawl and a ban, we all can be thankful for the second coming.
Forget Bazball, purely on an individual level, Stokes has left an indelible mark on how Test cricket is perceived. The 100th Test is just a validation of the greatness we have seen so far. May it long endure.
