IND vs ENG, 3rd Test: England not cutting down on Bazball despite loss to India, says captain Stokes

Ben Stokes’ 100th Test may have ended in exactly the opposite fashion than the one he would have wished for. But the England captain has stressed that England doesn’t need to temper its ultra-aggressive approach.

“No, not at all,” Stokes said when asked about the need for batters to temper down. “Our batting line-up is full of international class players. We give them the freedom to play what’s in front of them. You can see the difference in the two teams’ approaches playing out in India.

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“In the last two games, India put runs on the board (in) the way they want to operate. We have been able to do it at times but have not been able to sustain it for as long as we have wanted to,” he added.

With the game in the balance after the second day’s play, thanks to Ben Duckett’s swashbuckling hundred, Joe Root attempted reverse-ramp off Jasprit Bumrah on Saturday morning, was caught in the slips and the game continued to slip away from England thereon.

Stokes admitted the dismissal was the turning point in hindsight.

“Yeah, because he got out to it, definitely was a turning point. Joe Root has scored nearly 12,000 runs, I think we can leave the decision-making and ‘why’ with Joe. I can understand why there would be frustration around that because of how good a player Joe is,” Stokes said.