Ian Chappell Lauds Ben Stokes For His Excellent Leadership In India

England are facing a rather interesting challenge out here in India. And it seems that their worries are not only restricted to having lost the recent Test, where they twice had a chance to produce a 300-run team score.

On the one hand, they are up against a Jasprit Bumrah who seems to be clearly in this red-hot form with the red ball (Bumrah recently took six wickets at Vizag and broke the back of the English order).

On the other hand, India’s rising youngster with the flowing bat who is often hailed as the prince of batting, Shubman Gill too, seems to have found some form. His recent 104 that helped India carve a vital first inning total also played its big part in dragging England onto a position of backfoot from which it would never recover.

Now, interestingly, while he may not have made a huge sum of runs, not managing a century from the four innings when maybe such an effort could have kept England’s nose ahead in the contests, it is not that Ben Stokes hasn’t looked in some touch.

With scores of 47 and 70 at the Vizag and Hyderabad Tests, respectively, the New Zealand-born English cricketer has tried his bit, though without much success with the bat as on date.

And yet, what seems to have stood apart for Stokes is his captaincy for a rather young team. It is that facet of his cricket that earned him rich praise from none other than the great Ian Chappell.

Ahead of the next Test match, the third of the series, the former Australian batsman who was known to be a shrewd observer of the game and a voice many listen to for its insightful analysis had this to say about Ben Stokes:

“Ben Stokes’ aggressive approach to captaincy may have failed to claim victory in a hard-fought second Test but the five-match series against India is still wide open at 1-1. Much of England’s success has been attributed to Bazball – the desire to score quickly and tactically rattle the opposition – but this is a misnomer. What Stokes has really done is set out to achieve victory from ball one by playing aggressive cricket in all aspects of the game.”

That is not all; the great Ian Chappell would further highlight what makes Stokes a fine leader:

“Stokes has been extremely smart to adopt such an approach and his aggressive tactics have brought England great success in the win column. It’s an approach that England was extremely slow to adopt but Stokes has shown himself to be a strong-minded and smart leader.”

That being told, Sir Ian Chappell, widely considered as one of the greats of Australian cricket also had some interesting insights about the kind of belief that the present-day Test unit is showing in captain Ben Stokes. He would add sans much doubt:

“The England team has great belief in Stokes and it shows both on and off the field. The team takes wickets because they are continually looking for them, and this challenge is accepted by the bowlers. One of the great benefits of this strategy is that it enthuses the best players, and they are the ones most likely to affect the final result.”