Ben Stokes passed fit to play in England's second ODI against South Africa
Having erred on the side of fearlessness, not caution, for the two years since the last World Cup of lamentable memory, England have done so again by selecting Ben Stokes for the second one-day international against South Africa.
Stokes limped off after bowling only two overs in the first game at Headingley, and subsequently had a scan on the left knee which he had damaged so badly in the Test against Sri Lanka on the same ground last year that he needed an operation to remove cartilage. Next Thursday England launch the Champions Trophy in which almost every game is a must-win - but no, England decided not to rest their most indispensable cricketer in this three-match series against South Africa.
In England’s cause Stokes would run through a brick wall, or a dressing-room locker, and the scan was reported to have revealed nothing untoward. Still, his selection - not just as a batsman, because England say he will bowl some overs - is an indication of how determined they are to extend their seven-match unbeaten run and to go into the Champions Trophy with the scalp of the country which is ranked number one, although South Africa are demonstrably past their peak.
Stokes’s fitness test was a mini-drama in itself, not because he is a prima donna preening himself on his £1.7m IPL contract - the complete opposite in fact, a diehard team man - but because he brings more intensity to a practice session than others do to a Test. First was the squad’s warm-up football, without tackling it is true, but not what every doctor would have ordered for a recently strained knee.
Stokes followed up with two net-sessions of batting, first against England’s spinners then against England’s pace bowlers. But he was only beginning to build up a sweat on a boiling morning, though the hillside on which the Ageas Bowl has been built does catch the breeze.
His left knee strapped, Stokes embarked on the acid test of bowling in the middle, off a couple of paces at first, with England’s physiotherapist Craig de Weymarn wearing the keeping gloves. He lengthened his run-up over the space of about 20 balls, then bowled another ten flat out, including several bouncers which put maximum strain on the front knee. Bruce French, England’s wicketkeeping coach, had to take over the gloves for this burst.
So to a third, really serious session of batting practice. Stokes had been caught pulling by deep square-leg in the first international, from a hit of some 80 yards, so he had chest-high balls thrown at him on one side of the Bowl and made sure he mullered every one over 100 yards - over the net on the square where other England players were practising - to the other side of the ground where ball-boys were gathered. Stokes had become accustomed to short boundaries in India for the IPL, and he was not going to make the same mistake twice.
This second game could have been an opportunity to see if England could live without Stokes by promoting Moeen Ali to six, Chris Woakes to seven and Adil Rashid to eight, while bringing in David Willey to bowl Stokes’s overs. The man’s sheer force of personality, Bothamesque and Flintoffian, seemed to brush this option aside.
But no real batsman would want to miss a game on what promises to be an even flatter and higher-scoring track than Headingley was. It would just be nice, for England, if Jos Buttler could make a few. He made a 50 for Mumbai Indians but has not scored that many in his last six ODI innings.
Probable teams:
England: J Roy, A Hales, J Root, E Morgan (capt), B Stokes, J Buttler (wkt), M Ali, C Woakes, A Rashid, L Plunkett and M Wood.
South Africa: Q de Kock (wkt), H Amla, F du Plessis, A de Villiers (capt), J Duminy, F Behardien, C Morris, A Phehlukwayo, K Rabada, M Morkel and I Tahir.
