New Delhi: England Test captain Ben Stokes suffered a brutal facial injury after being hit by a cricket ball during a training session. Stokes shared the photo on social media and gave his fans a huge scare by showing a graphic close-up of his nasty injury.
The 34-year-old all-rounder shared a shocking picture on his Instagram story.
The picture, shared along with a cheeky caption, shows Stokes’ face with heavy swelling and bruising under his right eye, a cut on his cheek, and a cotton-wool plug in his nose to stop the flow of bleeding. “You should see the state of the cricket ball,” he wrote with a laughing emoji.
Ben Stokes’ Instagram story
Ben Stokes/Instagram
The latest injury is another addition to the all-rounder’s long t list of injury issues over the past two years. He has just returned to training after recovering from an adductor issue during the fifth Ashes Test in Sydney in early January, which forced him to sit out as a bowler in Australia’s second innings.
Ben Stokes’ injury woes continue
Before that, he tore his hamstring twice and was ruled out of England’s 2024 home series against India due to a shoulder injury. A year earlier, he went under the knife for knee surgery following a prolonged layoff.
Following a disastrous Ashes series, which England lost 4-1, Stokes and head coach Brendon McCullum were criticised for the team’s stubborn stance to continue the ‘Bazball’ approach despite continuous failure.
Though the England captain publicly stated his willingness to continue as the captain of the Test side. He remains contracted as skipper until the end of next summer.
It will be interesting to see how long Stokes will take to recover from the gruesome facial injury.
There is plenty of time to recover and rejuvenate as England’s red-ball season kicks off in June with back-to-back three-match series against New Zealand and Pakistan on home soil.