England captain Ben Stokes has grown in stature and confidence to become a true leader among men. Photo: The Telegraph/Rii Schroer < p>“I won’t give cookie-cutter answers to anything,” says Ben Stokes. “I don’t say anything just like that.” It's good to hear that from an England captain who has spent the last 17 months shattering conventional wisdom about how Test cricket should be played. Just as he captivates the nation with his wacky fielding formations, or his Goliath-like strength as a batsman, or his refusal to even think about playing a draw, he delights in the hour-long conversation taking unexpected directions. Not least when we move from discussing the Ashes to Brad Pitt.
It is Don «Wardaddy» Collier, Pitt's character in the World War II epic Fury, that Stokes models his leadership on. Apart from reading a cricket memoir, the game's true alpha male turns to a battle-hardened tank commander for tips on how to inspire him. «He told all the other guys in the broken down tank, 'Go ahead, I've got this, I'll fight them all off so you guys can leave,'» Stokes explains. «They said, 'No, we'll stay with you.'» The man he plays is very ruthless, but at the end of the day, the people he leads will do anything for him — not because they have to, but because they respect him so much. I don't want people to do what I ask them to do out of fear, I want them to do it out of respect.»
At 32, Stokes can hardly doubt how highly he is respected. He is a cricketer for life, a modern-day Hercules who can change a series through sheer force of will. Even with a creaky left knee, he electrified this summer in the Ashes with his relentless commitment to playing hard, hitting three sixes in an over at Lord's and pulling off an absurd juggling catch for a boundary at the Oval. But what makes him doubly charming is the way this bravura flourish conceals sharp vulnerabilities.
“I'm just happy to be myself… I try not to mess around too much.”
We meet in a luxurious townhouse in Cavendish Square, Marylebone, in the final days of unseasonable autumn heat. He is dressed for the weather: a black T-shirt, cream shorts and white sneakers. This look is completed with the attributes of success: a gold necklace, a gold bracelet and a gold watch. It's just two years since he announced an indefinite hiatus from the game to concentrate on his mental health. His injuries were so severe that when a woman asked him for an autograph at a local dry cleaner, he ran away, later recalling how he «couldn't cope anymore.» Finally, in August 2021, he had a panic attack and collapsed on the bathroom floor of his Nottingham hotel.
Sitting on a luxurious leather chair, there were almost no traces of this torment left on it. “I’m just happy to be myself,” Stokes says. “I try not to talk too much. What you see is what you get these days. In the past I might have put on a little show, a little face for different situations.”
Stokes looked relaxed during the Telegraph interview. Photo: The Telegraph/Rii Schroer
He's been open about his history of anxiety, revealing last summer in the documentary Phoenix From the Ashes with Sam Mendes that he was still taking medication and undergoing therapy. A year later, will he be able to better understand what causes his dark thoughts? “Most of all, when I’m at home and have free time. We all need something to take us away. I love to play golf. I'm into video games. People need to have something they can do so they can be okay.”
It's a complex kaleidoscope of psychological suffering that Stokes had to go through. One of them was the devastating loss of his father Ged to brain cancer in December 2020 at the age of 65. Stokes blamed cricket for strict pandemic restrictions that kept him away during his final days in New Zealand. Another problem was his habit of remembering every mistake and sorrow to such an extent that he felt ready to give up the sport completely.
If we go further back to 2019, we find that he was also privately struggling with hair loss. At 27, he had little to work with as overhead camera shots of his bowling performances showed a growing bald spot. “I saw my footage, and the angle was from a bird’s eye view, straight from above,” he muses. I thought, “God, this is getting worse and worse.” So he followed the path popularized by everyone from Graham Gooch to the late Shane Warne by booking a hair transplant.
Stokes on hair transplant. : “Stigma and secrecy are gone”
Around the corner from this stately London building is the Harley Street clinic where his procedure, follicular unit extraction, took place. The results are undeniable: Where once Stokes was concerned about how he looked on top, he now has enough hair to slick back into a shiny mane. And for the first time, he's finally ready to discuss why he had to do all this.
“Men and hair are important,” he says. “Previously, procedures were kept secret. It was almost one of those things where you didn't want people to know you did it. There is much more to it than just hair loss. If you start losing weight, you notice it and constantly try to do something to make it look less bad. As people get older, they want good hair. So, whatever they can do to feel better, why not? I know how I felt based on all the compliments I received. It gives you so much confidence. There is no more stigma and secrecy.»
Stokes brought glory to England at the 2019 Cricket World Cup. Photo: Getty Images/Clive Mason
Stokes is not shy to admit that his shyness about the situation nearly broke him. “I was lucky: I’m quite tall, so I stood taller than most people. But it got to the point where it became too much. So I went in, did it, and once I started seeing results, it gave me a lot more confidence knowing that I didn't have to worry about the same thing as before.»
Image matters to Stokes. After all, he once spent 28 hours under a needle to create a tattoo on his back depicting him, his wife Claire, son Leighton and daughter Libby as a lion, lioness and two cubs: a metaphorical signal that they could never be separated, even during long months on the road. These changes are not going unnoticed in the England dressing room. Stokes' hair growth is so noticeable that some of his teammates are already considering following suit. “A couple have had it, and a couple are talking about it,” he smiles. «Usually the conversation goes something like this: 'How much does it hurt?' I tell them it's going to hurt a little, but it's definitely worth it.»
'Even if I failed with the bat, it was a new success team mentality'
This should be a topic of conversation in the difficult months ahead. Stokes travels to India this week as part of England's one-day squad as he looks to reclaim the World Cup he helped win in 2019. He will return there in January for the first of five Tests, hell-bent on showing that his brash style can work even on the subcontinent's notoriously lifeless pitches.
«Buzzball» — a derivative of Brendon «Buzz» McCullum, England's Kiwi head coach and Stokes' fellow revolutionary — is an imprint of this hellish approach. The label is so common that it has found its way into Hansard, with one Conservative party member calling on the government to “apply a little baseball” to its post-Brexit trade deal with Australia. But what does this really mean? How did it allow England to go from one win in 17 Tests under Joe Root to 13 in 18 under Stokes? Rarely, if ever, has a sports team gone from a harbinger of doom to a purveyor of joy so quickly.
Brandon McCullum (left), the architect of Buzzball and Stokes at Lord's this summer. Photo: Getty Images/Philip Brown
If you listen to Stokes, who carefully avoids using the term, you will understand that Baseball is not a formal ideal, but a state of mind. “Even the older players managed to break down that wall: they were told to go out and do what they wanted without fear of consequences,” he says. “When I started, there was a huge shift in the way I wanted the team to play, not just with the bat or the ball, but also on the field. I needed to demonstrate what I wanted from the guys.
“At first I tried to get away by honking, but in my opinion I won every time it happened. Even if I hit it straight in the air and after we've hit 10 balls we're 50 for four, my teammates might say, «Oh, he really meant it.» We can go out and play fearlessly and not be told what a crap shot we hit because Stokesy is there and he's just been caught in the middle of the field when we're down four.» At that time people had a lot to say about this. But they didn't quite understand why I wanted to do it. If I failed, I truly felt like I had succeeded within the mentality I wanted the team to have.»
Only the best can pull off this trick of the light, convincing doubters that even a miserable mistake is a triumph in disguise. Stokes is one of that rare breed, a comic book colossus who takes audiences on a non-stop thrilling journey with his lumberjack hands and inexhaustible spirit. We saw it when he hit the decisive boundary in his defining Ashes innings at Headingley four years ago, celebrating with a primal roar. We saw it again during his 155th appearance at Lord's in July, a study in teeth-gritted defiance that no one present will forget in a hurry.
Stokes was at his best at Headingley in 2019 — and again during the Ashes series this summer. Photo: Getty Images/Gareth Copley
But Stokes, like many great athletes, is built differently. He is dismissive of that last thrilling century against Australia, aware that it did not end in England winning. “It’s on the honor roll,” he sighs. «But it doesn't really matter.»
He needed time to cope with the maelstrom of his first Ashes as captain, having experienced such fatigue last month that he found himself taking an afternoon nap. “I was exhausted,” he admits. “It was quite draining, both physically and emotionally.” There was much to admire about the series and how fiercely it was fought, even though England, despite winning two of the last three Tests, could not prevent Australia from retaining the urn. Circumstances were partly beyond Stokes' control: 48 hours of torrential rain in Manchester prevented his team from winning a Test they had dominated.
“I woke up several times over the course of two nights, checking to see if the rain had stopped,” he says. “On the last day I tried everything I could to stop the rain, but it didn’t work. I didn’t look out the window for two hours, and then I prayed that if I looked out, it would be sunny again.” He still looks tormented by the memories. «But it wasn't like that.»
It is amazing how much Stokes has mellowed since the fury of his youth. True, there are still outbursts of anger, strange signs that he is not inclined to suffer fools. In his words: «If you do anything to try to defeat me, I will know.» But the level-headed soul before me is a far cry from the angry young man who twice broke his arm throwing himself at inanimate objects in dressing rooms and who introduced a former team-mate at Cockermouth with the words: “I fought him once.” Today he tries to take his disappointments with equanimity.
Australian behavior towards the “strange” Lord
“I made a very conscious effort as soon as the Ashes was ready to get it done,” he says. «I can't say the same about the opposition.» Here he alludes to some of the Australians' notable antics after their return home, with opposition captain Pat Cummins deriding members of Marylebone Cricket Club — some of whom had criticized his players in the Long Room over Jonny Bairstow's controversial performance — as «the least scary crowd I ever seen.» “I don’t understand what’s going on with this,” Stokes says. “They can do whatever they want, but it’s weird.”
The sacking of Jonny Bairstow created a febrile atmosphere at Lord's. Photo: Getty Images/Stu Forster
His late father remains the guiding force in his life. Ged Stokes, who represented New Zealand in rugby league before moving his family to England in 2003 to coach Workington Town, was a man as tough as teak, famous for losing a finger while playing after he tried but didn't I was able to put the number back. place. Ben, who is modeled after the same uncompromising image, credits him with keeping him from going off the rails as a teenager.
“Dad was a huge influence on me from the ages of 15 to 19. During that period, especially where I grew up in Cumbria, it was so important to have someone to tell me, “No.” He still let me be a teenager.” He still let me make mistakes, but when it came to going to the gym in the morning , made me work. It was amazing.»
This fatherly wisdom determines the prospects he envisions for his children. Stokes is blessed with enormous intuitive intelligence and is considered England's fastest logic puzzle solver. But he left school with just one GCSE and is emphatic that he would like Layton and Libby to continue their studies. “I just didn’t get along with school, I didn’t like it. My mom and dad saw that it was completely pointless. But I want my children to have more desire to continue their education than I do, because… well, because they are my children.»
Gradually, Stokes even repaired his once-volatile relationship with journalists. He was so angry at his portrayal of the infamous 2017 Bristol street brawl, an ordeal that only ended when he was cleared 11 months later, that he condemned the media as «pieces of crap». The rift was made worse when, immediately after his heroics at Headingley in 2019, The Sun newspaper carried details of a tragedy involving his family on its front page. The newspaper paid substantial damages in 2021, apologizing and admitting the story should never have been published.
“Every day Flintoff spent with us, he became more confident.”
After this turbulent chapter, Stokes insists his grievances have subsided. “I thought it would be the hardest thing, from the media side, and I wasn’t expecting it,” he says. “But you know what, I really liked the press conferences because they give me the opportunity to speak. Even when things are going badly for us, I can repeat my point about why we do this and why we play the way we do.” What if someone dares to distort it? “The other day I saw a wonderful saying: “If you have a problem with me, write to me.” And if you don’t have my number, I don’t care.”
One person whose opinion he values is Freddie Flintoff. The former England captain, Stokes' hero growing up when he won the 2005 Ashes in the greatest series of them all, has just returned to the national team's embrace after suffering horrific facial injuries on the set of Top Gear last December. “Following his cricket career, Freddie's personality was perfect for television,” he says of Flintoff, who joined the coaching staff ahead of the one-dayer in Cardiff. “But then you see him come back and you can imagine him being involved as a full-time coach. He loved every minute of this process. He said he was in awe of what he witnessed. Every day he spent with us, he became more and more confident.”
This makes Stokes think about his personal future. For a long time, doubts swirled about his longevity and how much longer his exhausted body could endure. Luckily for anyone seduced by Bazball's gospel, he is adamant he will continue, saying he hopes to remain captain until the next home Ashes in 2027. “I never planned how many runs or wickets I want. Now that I'm 32, I'm quite realistic that at some point everything will come to an end. But I'm focused on what I want to be a part of over the next three to four years.»
What's next? Stokes grins, remembering that this game, for better or worse, is all he's ever known. “I can’t imagine not being involved in some way, even after I stopped playing. It’s in my blood to be there.”
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