Former Australian skipper Ricket Ponting praises Ben Stokes’ captaincy and says his commitment to moving things forward is a fantastic fillip for the Test game. Ben Stokes currently leads the England Test team in Ashes 2023 against Australia. The Ashes 2023 is scheduled to play between June 16 to July 31 across five venues in England.
Ponting Praises Ben Stokes’ Bold Captaincy
Ponting was one of many pundits and former players to discuss whether England would be able to successfully play in their new attacking style(Bazball) against a team of Australia’s calibre.
Ricky Ponting says that he has been thoroughly impressed with England and ‘Bazball’ in the opening 3 days of the 1st Test match of Ashes 2023 at Edgbaston.
“It’s hard to keep up with them all, he’s making a change almost every ball, which is great, it’s proactive captaincy. He’s always trying to move the game forward, he’s looking at any little way that he possibly can to pick up a wicket and change the momentum of the game,” Ponting noted.
“With Khawaja’s innings, I’d hate to try and count how many times he changed the field for him and how many bowling changes and tactical changes he made to try and get Khawaja out – and then it finally worked.
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen a field like that in Test cricket before. There was just an umbrella of fielders around in-front of the batsman’s face. And it was all about bowling a couple of slower balls and being able to bowl a yorker. And sure enough, Khawaja used his feet, gave himself some room, gave up his stumps, and the yorker knocked his off stump out of the ground.
“It’s fantastic stuff. It’s really refreshing for the Test game to see a team play this way and a captain happy to try everything he possibly can.”
During the 1st session of Day 4, England scored 155 runs for 5 wickets loss and leads by 162 runs. Ben Stokes and Jonny Bairstow stand at the crease with 13 and 1 run respectively.
