Stokes’ retirement highlights dilemma for English cricket’s bigwigs
“Three formats are just unsustainable for me now.” The words of England Test captain Ben Stokes as he announced that today’s one-day international against South Africa would be his last.
If that is what the 31-year-old World Cup winner stresses as he bows out of one of cricket’s three main formats, then domestic administrators must listen.
The Durham all-rounder will play his 105th and final 50-over international at his home ground in Durham having been a key part of a team under Chris Silverwood and Eoin Morgan that made England world champions at Lord’s in 2019.
Stokes “will give everything”
“I have loved the 104 games I have played so far,” he said. “I’ve got one more and it feels amazing to be playing my last game at my home ground in Durham.
“I will give everything I have to Test cricket, and now, with this decision, I feel I can also give my total commitment to the T20 format.”
This year’s international calendar has seen all three formats of the game jammed up against one another, with little rest between.
Only on Sunday did England finish their one-day series against India and they’re already just hours away from playing another against South Africa – with T20s and Tests to follow.
The schedule, combined with an ever-fulling domestic calendar, has increased concerns about burn-out in players.
Stokes must manage his own load as England’s new Test captain, but cricket must also do better to manage all of its players in turn.
“As hard as a decision as this was to come to, it’s not as hard as dealing with the fact I can’t give my teammates 100 per cent of myself in this format anymore,” he added.
“The England shirt deserves nothing less from anyone who wears it.”
Key call
Stokes’s one-day career will be remembered for his 84 not out in the World Cup final, as well as his contribution in the Super Over.
He has scored nearly 3,000 runs in one-day matches, taking 74 wickets along the way.
England men’s managing director Rob Key said Stokes’s decision would come to be seen “as one of the reasons he will play 120-plus Tests and help England in T20 matches and World Cups for many years to come. It is a typically selfless decision that will benefit England long-term.”
But why should a star cricketer need to take a “selfless” decision to retire because it’s “unsustainable” to do his job?
This should be a wake-up call for the England and Wales Cricket Board given their seeming desperation to fill every day of the summer with some form of cricket.
One player citing the schedule as key to his retirement is one thing, but what if one player becomes 10 and England lose some of their most recognisable players?
Stokes is an icon of modern cricket – outstanding across the international formats – and the bigwigs at Lord’s should be anxious to ensure that others don’t follow in his footsteps.