England captain Ben Stokes says he won’t make allowances for Australia and alter his model for the Ashes as that might render all of the progress of the final yr “completely pointless”.
The so-called ‘Bazball’ revolution has seen the Test aspect flourish underneath the management of the allrounder in partnership with coach and former New Zealand worldwide Brendon McCullum, with the workforce having claimed 11 wins in 13 matches.
Edgbaston hosts the opening Ashes Test, beginning Friday, and Stokes says regardless of the historical past between the 2 sides, the standard of the opposition and what’s at stake, he wouldn’t deviate from their attacking game-plan in opposition to the newly topped World Test Championship winners.
“Nothing is going to change because we’ve had unbelievable success with it,” Stokes, who mentioned his precedence was to make the whole lot “fun”, informed BBC Test Match Special.
“If we were to change anything from the last 12 months because we find ourselves in an Ashes series then anything from the last 12 months will have been completely pointless.”
“Even before getting together as a Test team for the first time with me as captain, there was one simple thing I said I had to be doing and that was being completely true to myself.
“I needed to keep true to how I’ve gone about issues as a participant, and do them as a captain. I had 85 or 86 video games earlier than I bought made captain, and the fellows that I’ve performed with knew me as an individual and a participant.
“So if I became captain and started doing things completely differently to what they knew me for, it would raise a few eyebrows.”
Source: www.perthnow.com.au
