Fans unhappy with Stokes’ decision to openImage Credit source: PTI
England’s Test team captain Ben Stokes has announced his retirement from international cricket. This sudden announcement by Stokes also surprised because his decision came during the fourth day of the Nottingham Test match against New Zealand. This decision disappointed the fans of England and since then Stokes is being remembered for his contribution. But after this decision, something happened which made many England fans angry and they are criticizing Stokes by calling him selfish.
The news of Stokes’ retirement came during the second session on the fourth day of the third and final match of the Test series at Trent Bridge. However, Stokes had informed his team about it even before the start of the day’s play. But the England Cricket Board made this information public in the middle of the day’s play. Immediately after this decision came out, Stokes won a lot of applause by taking one wicket.
But as soon as New Zealand’s innings ended and England started chasing the target, Stokes took a decision which surprised. In his last innings of international cricket, Stokes went straight to the opening. Stokes, who usually bats at number five or six, decided to open the team himself by replacing the team’s new opener Emilio Gay. As soon as Stokes came on the field, everyone was surprised to see this. As soon as he came, he started batting vigorously and finally got out after scoring 30 runs in 20 balls.
While English commentators were praising this move of Stokes or describing his different thinking, most of the fans did not like it. Not only the cricket fans of other countries but also the fans of England criticized this decision of Stokes and called him selfish. Expressing their displeasure on social media, many users alleged that Stokes completely hijacked the match and focused on himself.
Stokes is also being criticized because England had a difficult target of 373 runs to win this match and in such a situation the team needed intelligent batting, in which Stokes himself could handle the innings in the middle order. But not only did he upset the entire batting order, but he also made the match a joke with his batting, which did not go down well with the fans.
