Ben Stokes retires: the bottle, the kit bag, and a career like no other

“You don’t want to play for England. You just want to piss it up the wall with your mates, and have a good time.”Andy Flower said that to Ben Stokes in 2013, after he and Matt Coles were sent home from an England Lions tour of Australia for staying out until 5.30 in the morning. It was the kind of thing said to a talented young man who seemed determined to waste what he had been given.Around Christmas that year, Stokes was walking with his girlfriend Clare when they chanced upon Flower in conversation with other coaches. Stokes wanted to say: I told you so. Clare restrained him. She said Flower must have used it to motivate, not to disparage. Stokes knew she was right. He just couldn’t say it yet. What happened between that Lions tour and a dressing room at Trent Bridge on Sunday is the career.

He had already sat down with a psychologist by then, at Lord’s on a July day in 2013, sidling into the stands next to Mark Bawden. His captain at Durham had texted him: are you ok? He wasn’t. He told Bawden instead. Ben Stokes in action. (FILE photo)Bawden gave his verdict: Stokes was suffering from Bottle Bottle Bang syndrome. He had been throwing his emotions into a glass bottle for years. Bawden gave him a routine for the worst moments: go to the dressing room and pack up your kit bag. “My job is helping people realise that confidence isn’t the absence of fear or doubt. It’s trust in your method.” In March 2014 Stokes punched a locker and broke his hand. The bottle had banged again. ***Story continues below this ad A 258 in Cape Town in 2016. The fastest 250 in Test history. Eleven sixes, an England record. Then the T20 World Cup final in Kolkata. West Indies needed 19 off the last over, Carlos Brathwaite hit Stokes for four consecutive sixes. The bottle banged in public. He let the sixes go. That was new. Bristol, September 2017. A nightclub. Arrested. Charged with affray. Dropped from the Ashes tour. “The hardest bit was when the day had finished and I had gone back to my room. I didn’t want to leave the hotel. I was just sat on my bed.” Found not guilty. Fined. Returned, quietly, rebuilt. 2019 World Cup final, Lord’s. England fall to 86 for 4. Stokes makes 84 not out, ties the game, bats again in the Super Over. England win on boundary count. Six weeks later, Headingley. England set 359, slide to 286 for 9, last man Jack Leach at the other end. Leach scores one run. Stokes scores the rest. England win by one wicket.Story continues below this ad Hyderabad: England’s batter Ben Stokes plays a shot during the first day of the first Test cricket match between India and England, at Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium in Hyderabad, Thursday, Jan. 25, 2024. (PTI Photo/Shailendra Bhojak)His father Ged died in December 2020 from brain cancer. In June 2021 Stokes announced an indefinite break. “It was like I had a glass bottle I kept on throwing my emotions into. Eventually, it got too full and just exploded.” Five months away. He came back, as he always came back.