“Today was going to be my decision on when I stopped bowling,” said Stokes. “I’m pretty cooked. Bowling to win a Test match for your country on day five, if that doesn’t get you going, I don’t know what will.”
Stokes’ value as a cricketer will never be explained by statistics alone, even though his statistics are supersonic. Only two other men have done the Test double of 6,000 runs and 200 wickets, bona fide legends in Jacques Kallis and Garfield Sobers.
Stokes is better understood through the moments he creates. At Lord’s there were more than usual. The crucial direct-hit run out of Rishabh Pant in India’s first innings, knocking over Akash Deep with the final ball of the fourth day, the same day he created a photographer’s dream of lying prostrate on the pitch after the blow to the unmentionables.
On the fifth day, it was turning his body into an X to appeal for the lbw against Rahul, then willing sub fielder Sam Cook to take the catch as Bumrah’s miscue hung in the air. When Shoaib Bashir bowled last man Siraj and tore off in the direction of St John’s Wood underground station, Stokes was too exhausted to join the rest of the England team in running after him.
There is the question hanging over his batting, which is still experiencing a stodgy search for rhythm, especially against spin. Contributions of 44 and 33 were important, but the latter was interesting for what it did not include, rather than what it did.
With England struggling to build their lead in the second innings, wickets were falling on a difficult surface. There was the anticipation of Stokes flicking his ‘switch’, finding the mode that turns fielders into spectators and spectators into fielders. It never came. The switch is harder to locate these days, like feeling around the wall when the lights are off.
Stokes’ last Test hundred came at Lord’s, two years ago, a day when the switch definitely was flicked after Alex Carey’s controversial stumping of Jonny Bairstow in the second Ashes Test.
On that occasion, England used the needle between themselves and the Australians to come from 2-0 down and draw the series. Same venue, more needle, this time between England and India, sparked on Saturday evening and smouldering across the following two days. England looked a better team with fire in their bellies.
“Sometimes it just brings out another side of a team,” said Stokes.
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