HARD TIMES
Tricky tracks, no fans and top Indian spinners have made these the toughest conditions Stokes has played in... but that doesn’t excuse 205 ALL OUT
BEN STOKES has tried to reassure his England teammates that batting doesn’t get any harder than it has been in India this winter.
But even in the ‘hardest conditions’ of his 71-Test career the vice-captain admitted he and his colleagues were not good enough on day one of the series finale.
Being bowled out for 205 is actually quite an improvement on the third Test where England failed to total
200 across two innings, but now is not the time for backslapping.
England picked a batting heavy team with
Dan Lawrence replacing Stuart Broad and Dom Bess replacing the injured Jofra Archer, whose right elbow is still causing him problems more than a year after a stress fracture was diagnosed in South Africa, Archer is now a regular concern.
The paceman has bowled just 35 match overs this year, and his body is letting him down with a worryingly heavy workload to come over the next 12 months.
Yet with all the batsmen packing England’s line-up, they were still undone by a combination of outstanding skill from the Indian bowlers, and
their own lack of skills on a pitch that can be considered blameless. Stokes said: “We’ll look back on that and be disappointed by some of the batting, because we’re more than capable of scoring more than 300 on a wicket like that. It is so frustrating because it is definitely a better wicket than the last one so we are just disappointed we are not still batting. “I’ve played 70-odd games and I’ve told others this is the hardest conditions I’ve faced as a batsman, and I’ve played all around the world. We’ll try to put it behind us but it is easier said than done. We wanted to go and play a certain way as a batting group and our execution let us down.” Stokes was fuming with his own dismissal. He was well set on 55 only to be trapped lbw by a straight ball from Washington Sundar.
He also knows Zak Crawley and Lawrence will face criticism for dancing down the pitch and chipping the ball up in the air and getting caught and stumped respectively.
But he insists they are risks players must take if they are to be successful at scoring runs against the quality of India’s bowlers.
Spin duo Ravi Ashwin and Axar Patel shared another seven wickets between them while Mohammed Siraj added an injection of quality pace to a game in which England have picked just one specialist fast bowler in James Anderson.
Judging by the way the pitch and the ball has reacted, England’s attack for the third Test might have done quite well this week, but they have now gone the other way.
Stokes, Lawrence and Ollie Pope got themselves in and showed that runs could be scored, but partnerships of 48, 43 and 45 will remain starters, not a main course.
PATRICK BAMFORD admits he would have lost his mind if football had not returned after the first lockdown.
Sunday marks one year since Leeds United last played in front of home fans when they beat Huddersfield 2-0 watched by a crowd of 36,500 people at Elland Road.
Bamford had no idea when he netted the second goal that it would be the last one Leeds supporters would celebrate in person for a long time.
Days later the country went into lockdown and Bamford says he could not have coped if football had not returned in June behind closed doors.
When it did return, he played, and scored, in front of 2,000 Chelsea fans allowed in, as Leeds lost 3-1 at Stamford Bridge in December. But that feeling of a live, but limited, crowd was short lived before another lockdown.
“I know technically it’s a job, but it’s also a hobby, what you feel you were born to do, so to have that taken away from you is hard,” said the Leeds striker.
“In the three months we were locked down, we got to go out to exercise and try to push ourselves, but it’s not the same as competing and playing games. I don’t know what I would have done if it had gone on from March for the whole year. I would probably have lost my mind.
“Football is a game of highs and lows and going without football makes you appreciate even the lows.”
Leeds went top of the Championship by beating Huddersfield and Bamford remembers the players were preparing for their next game against Cardiff when football abruptly shut down.
“The next game was Cardiff and we didn’t realise until two days before that it was going to be such a big deal,” he told the Official Leeds United Podcast.
“No one had said the country was going to shut down for three months. Then everything just abruptly stopped. The next day the van turned up with the physio dropping off exercise kit and that was it.”
Leeds won the Championship behind closed doors and Bamford is enjoying his best season with 13 Premier league goals, but there is something missing.
“The one thing I miss most is when you score and you celebrate with the fans,” he said.
“You’re pumped up and you celebrate ferociously, then you see someone in the crowd going even more nuts and it just hypes you up even more.”
Leeds fans could return to Elland Road for their last match of the season against West Brom and Bamford says they will love Raphinha.
The Brazilian winger (celebrating with Bamford and Helder Costa, left) has starred for Leeds with five goals and five assists and Bamford said: “He’s the type of player people will pay just to go and see him because he does things that excite the crowd.
“The Leeds fans will love him when they see him in the flesh.”