England won’t just miss the batting and bowling of Ben Stokes, but also his presence on the field, which stands out due to his innovative field placements. However, a grade III muscle tear around his right shoulder made it a little too risky for the England captain to take the field for the fifth and final Test against India at The Oval.
“It’s one of those weighing up the risk reward, and the risk was way too high for damaging this (shoulder) any further than it currently is. I didn’t want to, and I wouldn’t expect to put any one of my players at risk with an injury like this,” Stokes said at the news conference on Wednesday, the eve of the final Test.
“I’ll start the rehab and focus on what we have coming up... Very disappointed but almost needed a bit more time than I normally would give to these kinds of things to make a decision,” added Stokes, as he expects to be fully fit in six to seven weeks ahead of the Ashes tour in Australia.
Playing as a specialist batter in the final Test in London had crossed the seamer all-rounder’s mind. “There was a bit of emotion going into this kind of stuff when you find out what you’ve done.
“I came down here this morning to give myself every chance of seeing if I could just play as a batter. Bowling was ruled out as soon as the scans came in. You need that time chatting with the medical team, Baz (head coach Brendon McCullum), and then almost just 20 minutes to myself out there, just to really be clear around the decision that we made,” he said.
Looking back on the last Test, Stokes had “no regrets” in his wish to end the game in Manchester, with 15 overs
left on the final day. “(Ravindra) Jadeja and Washington (Sundar) played incredibly well up until that point, so
you understand as to why they wanted to stay put there and get their hundreds.
“But, again, as I said at the end of the game, I’m not going to bowl any of my bowlers in a situation where we can’t win and expose any of those guys to injury. We’re over it. I think India too are over that whole thing,” Stokes said.