Ben Stokes: Resilient, talisman, empathetic or selfishly self‑centred?

World Cup finals are the sport’s cruel paradox. They can catapult you from the troposphere to the exosphere in an instant, turning you into the toast of the town. Brands queue up with blank cheques, desperate to bask in your limelight. Your manager is glued to the phone, juggling interviews and endorsement offers at a dizzying pace.

Suddenly you’re on talk shows you never imagined, while your cell phone buzzes endlessly with “new follower” notifications, strangers flooding your social media like a stock market spike.  

But finals also have another side. They can plunge you into a bottomless chasm where optimism evaporates, friends reveal themselves as fair‑weather companions, and sponsors begin to pull the rug from under your feet. Your phone still buzzes, but now with messages dripping in vitriol and abuse. Few know this duality better than Ben Stokes.  

Eden Gardens, April 3, 2016  

18 runs to defend. Last over. A T20 World Cup final. Carlos Brathwaite sent each ball arching into the night sky of Kolkata, a stage that crowned West Indies champions and left Stokes crumpled in anguish.

For Stokes, it wasn’t just the pain of being hit for four consecutive sixes; it was the crushing knowledge that England’s dream had slipped away because of his over. As the West Indies celebrated, Stokes sank to his knees, inconsolable, knowing he had cost his country the World Cup.

Moments like these linger far longer than they should. Cricket has a cruel memory, and history is littered with players defined by a single delivery. Chetan Sharma’s story is the perfect reminder. In Sharjah, in 1986, he had to defend three runs off the last ball. But he missed his yorker, and Javed Miandad dispatched his low full toss for six. Even Chetan’s historic hat‑trick in the 1987 World Cup, the first ever in the tournament, couldn’t erase that moment from collective memory.  

Stokes seemed destined for the same fate. Four sixes in a row, a final lost, a career branded by one over. Yet he refused to let Kolkata become his epitaph. He rebuilt himself, brick by brick, until he became indispensable to England’s lineup.  

Lord’s, July 14, 2019  

Life always offers redemption to those relentless in pursuit, and Stokes seized his when England needed 15 off the final over to lift their maiden ODI World Cup. Three years after the heartbreak at the Eden Gardens, he forced the game into a Super Over almost single‑handedly, then walked out again to carry England where no man had taken them before: to their first World Cup title.  

His Player of the Match performance embodied resilience. The bowler shattered in Kolkata had transformed into the saviour at Lord’s.

Headingley, August 25, 2019  

If Lord’s was redemption, Headingley was immortality. England, 1‑0 down in the Ashes, needed a victory to keep the urn alive. With 73 runs still required and only Jack Leach for company, defeat seemed inevitable.  

The Australians circled with voices sharp and mocking, certain the urn was theirs. Across England, living rooms fell silent as fans turned away, unable to watch what looked like the inevitable humiliation.

Numerous players had stood where Stokes now found himself, staring at certain defeat, left with a batting partner who struggled to clear the steam off his glasses, the odds of victory reduced to decimals. Yet the southpaw dared to look adversity in the eye and believed when even the most loyal supporters had surrendered to despair.  

He produced what Ricky Ponting described as “I’m not sure I’ve seen anything better than that on a Test ground.” That innings, now regarded as one of the greatest in Test history, transformed him from deliverer to England's talisman.  

The Measure of the Man  

Cricketing greatness often comes with a dangerous side effect: success breeds arrogance, and at the summit it’s easy to lose touch with humility. Where others at the summit often lose themselves to arrogance, Stokes carried his success with a quiet humility, defined as much by empathy as by excellence.

In February this year, he suffered a freak injury when Durham youth‑team keeper‑batter Robbie Bowman struck him in the face with a ball, leaving him with a broken cheekbone.  

What followed revealed something not every human, grimacing in pain, would have done. Stokes called Bowman from the hospital, though not to talk about himself, to reassure the youngster it wasn’t his fault. 

Durham coach Ryan Campbell told The Sun: “I'll tell you this because Stokesy never would. He phoned Robbie Bowman from his hospital and told him not to worry. He'd have known that Robbie would have been beside himself, but Ben said it was his fault. That sums up the sort of bloke Stokesy is.”

Only later, after surgery, did Stokes reflect in an ECB release: “A couple of inches one way or the other and I might not be here… I’ve got quite lucky, so I’m pretty thankful for that.”

This empathy wasn’t an isolated act. It was the same instinct that saw him protect Kai Barry and Billy O’Connell from homophobic abuse in Bristol in 2017, a night that led to a court case and his absence from England duty. It made him defend Ben Duckett when a video of him drunk in Noosa drew criticism, and support Jofra Archer when he was attacked for missing the recent Lord's Test against the Kiwis due to IPL commitments.  

Selfishly self-centred?

When Stokes announced his retirement before play on day four of the Trent Bridge Test against New Zealand, critics accused him of selfishness. His decision to open the innings was branded self‑indulgent. But those accusations missed the essence of his leadership.  

In his farewell, Stokes implored his teammates to “f***ing give absolutely everything for another two days.” He chose the hardest task, facing the new ball on a deteriorating pitch, because that is what leaders do. He looked like succeeding before luck deserted him.  

For Stokes, there was never any chance of slipping quietly away. His career numbers, entry into the rare 7,000‑plus runs and 250‑plus wickets club, achieved by only Jacques Kallis in the 149‑year history of the red‑ball format, meant the spotlight was always going to be on him. Even if he had chosen to retire later, the moment would still have been about him, with everything else forced into the background. His stature made him unavoidable, not self‑centred.  

And as Stokes walks away into the sunset, it scarcely matters how those with hearts full of malice and access to social media choose to remember him. 

Stokes will always be remembered as Nasser Hussain described him on Sky Sports: “One of England’s greatest ever cricketers, one of the finest captains they’ve produced… a clutch player, when you needed someone to stand up with bat or ball, Ben Stokes would absolutely do that. The game is about entertaining people, and Stokes was a serious entertainer… unbelievable will to get over the line… one of the best England captains I’ve seen, with gut feel and emotional intelligence to manage people superbly. The game will be poorer without Ben Stokes. International cricket will be poorer without Ben Stokes."