Stokes' Greatest Moments @ Headingley 2019, The World Cup Final and 15 Years of the Extraordinary

[Shane96]

Ben Stokes played 122 Tests across 15 years and produced enough extraordinary moments for three careers. The defining image is from Headingley in 2019: England needing 73 from the last wicket with Jack Leach at the other end, Stokes unbeaten and out of partners, hitting Mitchell Starc for consecutive sixes and eventually reaching an unbeaten 135 to win the match by one wicket. Leach's contribution was one run from 17 balls. Stokes hit 74 runs in the last wicket stand. That innings won an Ashes Test by one wicket and is considered one of the three or four greatest innings ever played.

Six weeks before Headingley came the 2019 World Cup final at Lord's. Stokes hit 84 not out from 98 balls to tie the match and force a Super Over. When Jofra Archer tied the Super Over, the match was decided on boundary countback, the most controversial finish in major cricket history. The boundary countback rule was changed as a direct result. Stokes did not know they had won for several seconds after the final ball because the players and officials were also confused. It was entirely appropriate that the most improbable World Cup victory in cricket history involved the most improbable performer in English cricket.

Under his captaincy the Bazball era produced moments no less extraordinary: the run chase of 378 against India at Edgbaston in 2022, the 506 on day one in Rawalpindi, the Ashes retention in Australia, India beaten at home after decades of England failure in the subcontinent. Stokes took 200 Test wickets and scored more than 6,000 runs. He won the ICC Test cricketer of the year award four times. No England cricketer since Ian Botham has mattered more in the long form of the game.

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