Ben Stokes blames this player for England's first Test series loss in the Bazball era

No, the England team under the innovative coaching and captaincy of Brendon McCullum and Ben Stokes will not become the first side since 2012 to beat the Indians on their home soil in a red-ball series as Rohit Sharma’s side claim victory in the 4th Test by 5 wickets in Ranchi.

Following the 3rd consecutive loss, Stokes claimed that he can only take pride in the way his inexperienced side played in the Anthony De Mello trophy series.

For the Indian team, their victory in the 4th Test not only wins them the Anthony De Mello trophy series but also extends their home dominance to 17 straight Test series wins on the trot.

When Ben Stokes and co. had arrived for this tour with their Bazballing mindset, many had written off the hosts from continuing their home dominance which was aggravated after Virat Kohli opted out of the entire series and India handed debuts to 5 players.

Nonetheless, this series will be talked about for a long time as the one that pushed newbies like Yashasvi Jaiswal, Sarfaraz Khan, Rajat Patidar, Dhruv Jurel, and Akash Deep.

It is also a shame for the England team as they failed to beat a much more naive Indian side without some of its key players and when they head over to the hills of Dharamshala, it is only going to get difficult.

Also Read: It’s been a while since India had an opener like Yashasvi Jaiswal claims Anil Kumble

“I think it was a great Test match”, Stokes opens up on Ranchi’s loss

While speaking to Sanjay Manjrekar in the post-match presentation, Ben Stokes opined that their 5-wicket loss in Ranchi was perhaps a good contest but was unhappy with the way things unfolded. He also stated that he was proud of the efforts his English team had put up, saying that he couldn’t have asked for more.

“I think it was a great Test match. If you see the scoreboard, it’ll say India won by 5 wickets, but it doesn’t give credit to the way things unfolded, the ebbs and flows on every single day it happened. I can only be proud of my team, we’ve had some inexperienced spinners (Bashir and Hartley), but I’m proud of their efforts, they came here without a lot of exposure, and the way they kept bowling, I can’t ask for anything more.” – Stokes said during post-match presentation.

“Incredibly difficult”, Ben Stokes hails Kuldeep, Ashwin and Jadeja

Speaking about the conditions in Ranchi, Ben Stokes claimed that the surface only deteriorated as the game went on and hailed India’s spin batter consisting of Kuldeep Yadav, Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja as absolutely unplayable.

He also highlighted the fact that both India and England gave debut caps to a couple of youngsters, something he believes is going to be fruitful for the future of Test cricket.

“I am a massive Test cricket fan, the numbers of youngsters coming along in both teams sets things up nicely for the future of Test cricket. If you look at yesterday, anything was possible, it was incredibly difficult batting against the spinners, scoring became difficult and so was rotating the strike. We knew the pitch wouldn’t get any better, as we saw today.” – Stokes added.

Also Read: Michael Vaughan delivers his final verdict on the Ranchi pitch after talking about it on all 4 days

Criticism on Joe Root unfair, Stokes on question marks over former England captain’s batting

Ben Stokes shed light on the 4th Test’s only centurion Joe Root who was struggling to score runs in the series before the Ranchi Test. Root had scores of 29, 2, 5, 16, 18, and 7 before his 112* in the 1st innings and 17 in the 3rd innings.

Stokes lashed out at those making negative comments about Root, stating that the latter should not be questioned especially after he has scored over 11,000 runs.

“I don’t think the criticism of Joe Root has been fair, the sheer amount of cricket he’s played, got 12,000 Test runs. He’s incredible.”

“What a story”, Stokes on Shoaib Bashir’s debut Test series

The England captain then spoke about how well their 20-year-old right-arm off-spinner Shoaib Bashir did on his debut Test series, praising him for showing incredible character with his maiden five-wicket haul in the 2nd innings which was his first ever in any level of red-ball cricket.

“So is Bashir, what a story, what a journey, taking 8 wickets including a 5-fer against India after having hardly played a lot of cricket is superb.” – Stokes on Shoaib Bashir.

Also Read: ‘Dhruv Jurel showed composure and calmness’ – Rohit Sharma after India hammer England in 4th Test

“My message is simple”, Ben Stokes’ closing words after the series loss

Lastly, Ben Stokes stated that he has always been a serial winner who likes to win cricket matches wherever they play and whoever they play against and had a message for his England mates that he is nothing but proud of their effort and that he is happy with the way they fought.

“You want to win series, you want to play and win cricket matches. I’ve been here for a couple of years (as captain) and my message is simple. The only thing I can say is we left nothing on the field, we’ve fought hard and I’m happy with that.” – Stokes concluded.