Stokes delivers England’s
greatest Test innings of all
Sport Third Specsavers Ashes Test
At Emerald Headingley England won toss
AUSTRALIA - First Innings R B 4 6
DA Warner c Bairstow b Archer 61 94 7 0
MS Harris c Bairstow b Archer 8 12 2 0
UT Khawaja c Bairstow b Broad 8 17 1 0
M Labuschagne lbw b Stokes 74 129 10 0
TM Head b Broad 0 6 0 0
MS Wade b Archer 0 3 0 0
*†TD Paine lbw b Woakes 11 26 1 0
JL Pattinson c Root b Archer 2 8 0 0
PJ Cummins c Bairstow b Archer 0 13 0 0
NM Lyon lbw b Archer 1 4 0 0
JR Hazlewood not out 1 3 0 0
Extras (b4 lb2 w5 nb2) 13
Total (52.1 overs) 179
Fall 1-12 2-25 3-136 4-138 5-139 6-162 7-173 8-174
9-177 10-179.
Bowling SCJ Broad 14-4-32-2, JC Archer 17.1-3-45-6,
CR Woakes 12-4-51-1, BA Stokes 9-0-45-1.
AUSTRALIA - Second Innings R B 4 6
DA Warner lbw b Broad 0 2 0 0
MS Harris b Leach 19 39 3 0
UT Khawaja c Roy b Woakes 23 38 4 0
M Labuschagne run out 80 187 8 0
TM Head b Stokes 25 56 3 0
MS Wade c Bairstow b Stokes 33 59 6 0
*†TD Paine c Denly b Broad 0 2 0 0
JL Pattinson c Root b Archer 20 48 2 0
PJ Cummins c Burns b Stokes 6 6 1 0
NM Lyon b Archer 9 17 1 0
JR Hazlewood not out 4 5 1 0
Extras (b5 lb13 w2 nb7) 27
Total (75.2 overs) 246
Fall 1-10 2-36 3-52 4-97 5-163 6-164 7-215 8-226
9-238 10-246.
Bowling JC Archer 14-2-40-2, SCJ Broad 16-2-52-2, CR
Woakes 10-1-34-1, MJ Leach 11-0-46-1, BA Stokes
24.2-7-56-3.
ENGLAND - First Innings R B 4 6
RJ Burns c Paine b Cummins 9 28 1 0
JJ Roy c Warner b Hazlewood 9 15 2 0
*JE Root c Warner b Hazlewood 0 2 0 0
JL Denly c Paine b Pattinson 12 49 1 0
BA Stokes c Warner b Pattinson 8 13 1 0†JM Bairstow c Warner b Hazlewood 4 15 1 0
JC Buttler c Khawaja b Hazlewood 5 16 1 0
CR Woakes c Paine b Cummins 5 9 1 0
JC Archer c Paine b Cummins 7 8 1 0
SCJ Broad not out 4 5 1 0
MJ Leach b Hazlewood 1 7 0 0
Extras (lb3) 3
Total (27.5 overs) 67
Fall 1-10 2-10 3-20 4-34 5-45 6-45 7-54 8-56 9-66
10-67.
Bowling PJ Cummins 9-4-23-3, JR Hazlewood 12.5-2-
30-5, NM Lyon 1-0-2-0, JL Pattinson 5-2-9-2.
ENGLAND - Second Innings R B 4 6
RJ Burns c Warner b Hazlewood 7 21 0 0
JJ Roy b Cummins 8 18 1 0
*JE Root c Warner b Lyon 77 205 7 0
JL Denly c Paine b Hazlewood 50 155 8 0
BA Stokes not out 135 219 11 8
†JM Bairstow c Labuschagne b Hazlewood 36 68 4 0
JC Buttler run out 1 9 0 0
CR Woakes c Wade b Hazlewood 1 8 0 0JC Archer c Head b Lyon 15 33 3 0
SCJ Broad lbw b Pattinson 0 2 0 0
MJ Leach not out 1 17 0 0
Extras (b5 lb15 w10 nb1) 31
Total (9 wkts) 362
Fall 1-15 2-15 3-141 4-159 5-245 6-253 7-261 8-286
9-286.
Bowling PJ Cummins 24.4-5-80-1, JR Hazlewood
31-11-85-4, NM Lyon 39-5-114-2, JL Pattinson 25-9-
47-1, M Labuschagne 6-0-16-0.
Umpires JS Wilson (Trinidad & Tobago) and CB Gaffaney
(New Zealand).
TV Umpire HDPK Dharmasena (Sri Lanka).Player of the match BA Stokes (England).England beat Australia by one wicket
5-match Ashes series level 1-1.
1st Test (Edgbaston) Australia won by 251 runs
2nd Test (Lords) Match drawn
4th Test (Old Trafford) Sep 4-8
5th Test (The Oval) Sep 12-16Scyld Berry
CRICKET JOURNALIST
OF THE YEAR
at Headingley
IST
Ashes were lost before
all-rounder’s 135 not out
Leach also stands firm in
last-wicket partnership
It might not have been the greatest
Test match, because there have
been 2,357 of them, but Ben Stokes’s
match-winning and series-saving
135 was unequivocally the finest
ever played for England because of
the immensity of the pressure he
was under.
Two of the hitherto finest innings
for England were played at Head-
ingley – Graham Gooch’s 154
against West Indies in 1991 and Ian
Botham’s 149 – but neither faced
such a fourth-innings crisis as
Stokes did, with England 1-0 down
in the Ashes and unable to regain
the urn if they lost, and only Jack
Leach to help him score the last 73
runs to win.
Stokes had scored only 61 at this
stage, when England had nine
wickets down. He had been as dor-
mant as a volcano, because Austral-
ia’s bowling had been so good: after
66 balls he had scored two runs. But
therein lies the secret of all of
Stokes’s miraculous innings: he
plays himself in before attempting
the impossible, in this case Eng-
land’s highest ever successful run
chase (332 the previous record), and
their highest match-winning stand
for the 10th wicket by far. Three
Yorkshire elements had played a
crucial part in softening up Aus-
tralia ahead of Stokes’s assault. One
was Joe Root, who had blocked on
Saturday afternoon to put lead in
the boots of Australia’s four bowl-
ers, forcing their quicks into fifth
and sixth spells. Root faced 322
balls for his 77 – and, thereby, teed
up the tired Josh Hazlewood for
Stokes to smash for 19 in one over.
The second local element was
Jonny Bairstow, who helped Stokes
by upping the tempo when Aus-
tralia took the second new ball.
Stokes had been stuck – England
could not score a run for the first 25
minutes of day four – but Bairstow
sensed the moment to counter-at-
tack, and pressurised James Pattin-
son in particular. Four overs
suddenly cost 36. One of Pattinson’s
cost 13, and even though only four
of them came off Bairstow’s bat, the
extras – like five wides – betrayed
Australia’s first anxieties.
The third Yorkshire component
was the crowd, who did the same
unnerving job on the Australian
fielders which the Hollies Stand at
Edgbaston usually does, though
not in this series when England
went 1-0 down. They cheered Root
and Bairstow parochially, then
roared on Stokes to power England
towards the line. Before the vol-
cano exploded, England had to
undergo their first run out of this
series when Stokes started for a sin-
gle then sent Jos Buttler back, too
late, as Buttler was beaten by Travis
Head’s dive and underarm direct
hit. There was to be no repeat of
their match-tieing stand in the
World Cup final. It was Stokes’s
fault, and
seemed to
make him dig
ever deeper.
Jofra Archer
chipped in with
a couple of slogs,
against Nathan
Lyon before being
caught at deep
square. Those runs
helped because
Stokes, as a left-
hander, had been
shackled by Lyon rip-
ping his off-breaks out
of the rough. It was
going to be high risk to
launch against Lyon,
and Stokes bided his time
until Leach was his final
partner, and had to.
Stuart Broad is built like
Graham Dilley but could not
replicate the assistance which Dil-ley had given to Botham in 1981,
when his 149 gave Australia some-
thing – too much – to chase. So
Leach strode to the wicket, for the
ultimate test of nerve and charac-
ter, to which he responded per-
fectly. Stokes, finally, launched his
hail of sixes like molten lava. He
had pulled Pat Cummins into the
Western Terrace during his 61-run
reconnaissance but now every
bowler was taken down. He smote
Lyon straight for six – high risk per-
force – to bring up England’s 300,
and in the same over played his
most amazing stroke, a reverse
sweep for six, the ball warmly re-
ceived on the Western Terrace.
His second most astonishing
stroke was the scoop for six, against
Cummins no less, bringing Eng-
land’s target down to 40. Next it
was Hazlewood’s turn to be
thrashed for that 19 off an over,
when Stokes pulled a four and
swept a six – and this was not just
brawn and talent and a superman’s
motivation, but brain too,
because he was targeting
the Western Terrace as the
shorter of the two square
boundaries.
Hazlewood, the hitherto
unsloggable Hazlewood, was
not going to be released yet from
his torment – that of a cricketer
knowing he is losing the game for
his side. After four and six off his
first two balls, Stokes pulled
another six. England wanted –
desired, craved, yearned for – 18
to win. During this epic on-
slaught Stokes had three
pieces of luck. First, no tea
break intervened to dis-
rupt his flow, as nine
wickets were down and
the interval delayed.
Second, he was
dropped. Third,
Australia wasted a
review, so they
had none left,
when they would
have won by one
run. Cummins, with 17
to win, and here the sec-
ond piece of luck, when
Marcus Harris ran in from
third man but could nothold on. Stokes chastened? He
pulled the next ball for four, and
straight-drove the next for four
more in his most regal stroke. Eight
to win after another single off Cum-
mins, and two blocks by Leach
which Stokes, on his knees at the
non-striker’s end, could barely
watch.
Australia were caught in the
headlights, as they were more than
once in 1981, mesmerised by the
force which is an all-rounder whose
time has come; the element of in-
spiration has not featured in their
methodical game plans.
Paine tried nothing new, so
Stokes launched Lyon again and
watched – on his haunches – as the
ball cleared Marnus Labuschagne
at long off: had Labuschagne caught
it, he, not Stokes, must have been
player of the match.
A single to tie, which Stokes tried
to run after reverse sweeping – and,
amid tumult, Leach would have
been run out when sent back if
Lyon had not fumbled the throw.
James Anderson had been dis-
missed by the second last ball of the
Sri Lanka Test here. Not Leach,
who steadfastly pushed a single to
level the scores.
Without further ado Stokes
smote through the covers to bring
fielders to their knees, and specta-
tors to their feet, achieving what
had been impossible, and levelling
this series. Leach’s single, in what
was the final over, was his crucial
contribution to the stand of 76, and
Stokes’s 74. The third piece of luck
was Paine wasting his last review
on Leach, who was nowhere near
lbw to Cummins. When England
needed two to win, it transpired
that Stokes would have been given
out on review when he missed a
sweep at Lyon. Fate, and Joel Wil-
son, were understandably on
Stokes’s side.
Idle to compare this climax with
that of the World Cup final: that was
white ball and this was red. Suffice
they were both unique moments in
a sport which seems ever more
capable of epic finishes. Stokes is
already the equal of Botham in 1981,
or Andrew Flintoff in 2005, and
perhaps with more to come.By Tom Morgan at Headingley
Ben Stokes described last night
how he summoned one of the
greatest performances in Ashes
history after dining on “knock-off
Nando’s” takeaways.
The England all-rounder’s mag-
nificent 135 not out to clinch victory
at Headingley was hailed as “freak-
ish” by his captain, Joe Root. Root
said the remarkable performanceKeeping Ashes alive is a
special feeling – Stokes
Root: This will change
perceptions of the game
STU FORSTER/GETTY IMAGESWinner: Ben Stokes punches the Phenomenal
air after his series-saving showHeadingley scoreboard
2 ** Monday 26 August 2019 The Daily Telegraph
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