He may not yet have strapped his pads on in anger – though that moment is only days away – but Ben Stokes has made his first significant contribution to England’s World Cup campaign: delivering a speech in the dressing room after the dismal defeat against Afghanistan on Sunday that has helped to bolster the team’s crushed morale.
It is a job he has done before, in Melbourne when England lost against Ireland in the T20 World Cup last year – after which they won every remaining game to take the trophy. “He’s like the spiritual leader of the group in many ways,” said Matthew Mott, England’s white-ball coach. “He certainly spoke really well the other day, and spoke about that need to really assert ourselves.
“I talked about the plan going forward for the next few days, and then Stokesy came in on the back of that and just really reinforced what was a great message, particularly from someone who’s sitting on the bench and had a bit of a different lens on things. I think it went down well, it brought us back to controlling what we can control really. Places like India, World Cups, there’s so many distractions out there and if you don’t get that clarity about what we can control it can get big on you.”
The result, Mott said, was an immediate change in mood. “I think everyone thought [before the Afghanistan game] we were in a good place,” he said. “We thought we had [won] a really good toss, and we thought: ‘Here we go, here’s our chance.’ It didn’t go to plan at all. The heads were down, there’s no doubt about that. But I genuinely think we turned it around a little bit.”
England have started their World Cup defence terribly, losing two of their first three games, and on Saturday play South Africa, themselves nursing the pain of unexpected defeat after the Netherlands curtailed their run of good form in Dharamsala on Tuesday night. As attention shifts to that game Mott said that “sometimes in tournaments if you get off to a flyer it can be a bit of a curse in many ways”, that “if anything we’ve probably just tried a bit too hard” and that – even with the side likely to need five wins from their six remaining games – “it’s not panic stations yet”.
“It’s nowhere near the start that we were hoping for, and the time is now to turn that around,” he said. “When I spoke after the game the other night there were three main points: the effort is important and I think that’s there, the boys are trying really hard. But we’re probably missing that confidence to puff your chest out, go out there and really take the game on, which this team has been renowned for over a long period of time. You don’t lose your ability overnight, but you can lose your confidence.
“And then it’s our general attitude. We pride ourselves on putting the opposition under pressure, and on reflection we’ve been the reactive team in those two games and we need to turn that round really quickly.”
When Brendon McCullum – who happens to be in Mumbai on personal business – was appointed as England’s red-ball coach last May he memorably said he had not wanted the white-ball role because it was “too cushy”. It does not look so cushy now. “I’ve got one of the greatest jobs going round but you have to take the rough with the smooth. It’s not always a great job,” Mott said.
“Sometimes it’s a spot where you’re under a lot of pressure, as our players are. But you play for those great days. We got written off after Ireland [last year], and then you come back and you play the way you want to play – that’s incredibly satisfying. That’s what gets you out of bed.”
Stokes looks certain to return to the side on Saturday, though not necessarily in place of his nominal understudy, Harry Brook, who scored an impressive 66 against Afghanistan. Beyond that Mott seems inclined to give the players responsible for England’s dismal start the chance to remedy it.
“I can guarantee you now there won’t be any wholesale changes with the team,” he said. “We’ll always look at minor tweaks but I’m not going to throw the baby out with the bathwater after a couple of bad performances.”
