Ben Stokes guides England to thrilling victory to seal series win over Pakistan

Getty Images
Will Macpherson17 May 2019

This was very nearly fileable under: another of those occasional England cock-ups. As it was, they averted a crisis and it was fileable under: another successful England chase, and another England series win. They got home by three wickets at Trent Bridge, but not without one hell of a scrap.

When Jason Roy was dismissed, caught down the legside for a brilliant 114 from 89 balls, England needed 140 more runs from 134 balls with eight wickets in hand: a stroll. They were chasing 341 but Roy, in stands of 94 with James Vince and 107 with Joe Root, had broken the back of it.

Few would have envisaged then that England would still need 81 to win off the final nine overs, with just four wickets in hand. But Roy’s wicket brought about a full-blown English wobble. Root tried to hit out, then Jos Buttler and Moeen Ali, both scoreless, played feckless sweeps. England had lost four for 15 in 17 balls. Joe Denly had consolidated, but fell to a brilliant caught and bowled by Junaid Khan, who had been the worst offender in a farcical fielding performance all day. There England were, in a right pickle.

Up stepped Ben Stokes, with a little reminder of his magic, and Tom Curran, who had a fine day with the ball too, to put on 61 (with a little luck along the way) in 44 balls. Stokes struck the ball cleanly, while Curran scrambled hard, although he should have been run out on seven. Even when Curran was bowled in a brilliant 48th over by Hasan Ali, Stokes – with some help from Adil Rashid and more awful fielding – still had the job in hand.

The buildup for England centred around their pace duo Jofra Archer and Mark Wood and, as they got going with their respective new balls, all eyes were on the pace gun. Wood was quicker early on, averaging more than 90mph (to Archer’s 87) in his first three overs, but Archer was well into this nineties in his fourth. By then, Wood had battered Imam-ul-Haq’s elbow, forcing him to retire hurt. After a trip to hospital revealed nothing more than bruising, he returned, oddly, at the death, unable to do play in the manner required.

AP

But for all the openers’ fire, it was Curran who stole the show and surely ended any doubt over his place in the World Cup squad. It is down to two: David Willey or Denly.

It was with Denly that Curran bowled his first impressive spell. Denly, perhaps notably under Buttler rather than Eoin Morgan, was brought on early to stem Babar Azam and Fakhar Zaman’s progress. He did well enough to stay on for five overs, and the 27 he conceded made him England’s most economical bowler of the day. It was the role he had been picked to do.

At the other end Curran worked through five overs, picking up Fakhar’s wicket with the last ball of his spell, caught well at third man for 57.

Babar was joined by Mohammad Hafeez, and they just ticked away, with their run-a-ball rate a little too slow for the venue – with its ludicrously short boundary – or their opposition, with its mighty batting lineup. Both prettily worked past milestones (fifty for Hafeez and a century for Babar) before getting out belatedly trying to kick on. Hafeez duffed to mid-on off Wood, while Babar fell to another fine catch in the deep off Curran.

So Pakistan arrived at the death well placed enough, but with new batsmen at the crease and some smart enough bowling from England, they did not kick on. They made 88 off the last 10, but should have got more. Wickets fell regularly, with two more to Curran and one each for Archer and Wood when Imad Wasim broke his own stumps.

Getty Images

340 looked short of what they could have had and Roy, who finally converted his third fifty in three innings with a series of outrageous strokes, was making it look routine once more.

The stroke he played to reach his seventh ODI century was the most absurd of the lot. Given two of his previous three sixes were a pull that barely got above head height and a ramp, that is a high bar. But this one, to move from 95 to 101 off his 75th ball, was a six over extra cover, off the back foot, against the spin. Amazingly, it was the slowest of England’s three centuries this series: at that stage, England were in no hurry.

A little later on, they were in a hurry. They were very grateful that Stokes picked up where Roy had left off, and for the test they had survived.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in