England captain Ben Stokes confident of Ashes fitness despite shoulder injury
He was initially hopeful about lining up in Thursday's fifth Test at the Kia Oval, but scans revealed a grade three tear – the most severe category – meaning he now faces six to 10 weeks of rehabilitation.
The road back starts here 👊 pic.twitter.com/MH6xObtj7c
— England Cricket (@englandcricket) July 30, 2025
And while he will play nothing more than a cheerleading role in the final match a series where he has emerged as the key performer, the medical advice suggests he is confident of being back in time for what has been billed as a legacy-defining trip to Australia.
The Ashes begins in Perth on November 21, with England flying out a fortnight earlier, and he was quick to assure fans he intended to be there.
Stokes opted to take the captain's pre-match press conference in place of deputy Ollie Pope, who will lead the team on home turf with the side 2-1 ahead, and was asked directly if he expected to be ready.
'Yeah. It's six or seven weeks probably,' he said, taking an optimistic view of the prognosis.
'I'll start rehabbing now and obviously focus on what we've got coming up in the winter. It's a decent tear of one of the muscles I can't pronounce. I woke up the morning after the game and it was pretty sore so I wasn't surprised that the scan showed something.
'There was obviously a bit of emotion going in when you find out what you've done. I think you need time chatting with the medical team, Baz (head coach Brendon McCullum), and then it was just 20 minutes to myself out there in the morning, just to really be clear around the decision that we made.
'It is one of those where you're weighing up the risk-reward and the risk was way too high for damaging this any further than it currently is. I wouldn't expect to put any one of my players at risk with an injury like this. The series has taken a big toll.'
Stokes knows the ropes better than most when it comes to arduous recovery periods. The 34-year-old underwent surgery on a longstanding knee issue in late 2023 and suffered two serious hamstring tears last year.
He bounced back better than ever this summer, racking up 140 overs with the ball and facing almost 600 deliveries, but may have ultimately pushed himself beyond his body's capacity.
Yet he has no regrets about taking such a punishing workload.
'Not at all. When I'm out on the field I play to win and give everything I possibly can,' he said.
'If I feel there's a moment in a game where I need to put everything I'm feeling aside, I'll do that because that's how much this team means to me, how much playing for England means to me, how much winning means to me.
'Being a professional sportsman, injuries are part of this game and I can't do anything about that.'
Stokes' absence means a first Test appearance of the year for rising star Jacob Bethell, who turned heads in New Zealand in December but has been restricted to 12th man duties since.
Ben Stokes will miss out on the final Test of the series with a right shoulder injury ❌
And we've made four changes to our side 👇
— England Cricket (@englandcricket) July 30, 2025
That is one of four changes to the England XI, with Liam Dawson standing down one match into his comeback and pace pair Brydon Carse and Jofra Archer rested.
In come three fresh quicks, Gus Atkinson and Jamie Overton making their first appearances of the series at their Surrey home and Josh Tongue back after sitting out the last two games.
'We've got a team of 11 match winners. One person doesn't win you a game and just because I am playing or I'm not playing doesn't mean we're going to win or lose,' said Stokes.
'We've have seen people put in some pretty special individual performances and it's another opportunity for another 11 people to hopefully put their hand up and win a game for England.'
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Chris Woakes ‘all in' and will bat with dislocated shoulder if needed
For the fifth Test in a row, the game is going all the way to the final day after a nerve-wracking fourth evening left all results possible. Brilliant centuries from Root (105) and Harry Brook (111) had England cruising towards a remarkable chase, set fair on 301 for three hunting 374, but they lost three late wickets to leave things in the balance. Bad light and rain halted a thrilling conclusion in its tracks, with England needing 35 runs and India seeking four more wickets. One of those belongs to Woakes, who has not featured since badly damaging his left shoulder while fielding on Friday. He was ruled out of the game the next morning but has remained with the team and is willing to bat at number 11 with his arm in a sling if required. 'You probably saw him in his whites in the dressing room. He's all in, like the rest of us,' said Root. 'Clearly, he's in a huge amount of pain. But it means a huge amount to him and it just shows the character and the person that he is, that he's willing to put his body on the line like that for England. Look who's in his whites in the dressing room 👀 — England Cricket (@englandcricket) August 3, 2025 'If it does come to that, hopefully he can get us across the line and win an incredible series.' Root was not surprised to see a dramatic end unfold after almost seven weeks of full-blooded battle but, having done a huge amount of the heavy lifting alongside Brook, still fancies England to triumph. 'It was always going to happen like this wasn't it? Just look at the first four games,' he said. 'It's been amazing to play in and quite fitting that we're going to get that kind of finish. It's been one hell of a series, one hell of a journey, and there's clearly confidence in our dressing room. I'd like to think we've got what we need to get across the line.' Harry Brook, left, and Root made centuries (Ben Whitley/PA) Root had earlier marked his 39th Test hundred, and third this summer, with a touching tribute to the late Graham Thorpe. The former Test batter, who took his own life last year, enjoyed a close relationship with Root during his time as England's assistant coach. When he reached three figures, Root produced one of the Thorpe-inspired white headbands Surrey have been selling to raise funds for the MIND mental health charity and wore it as he looked to the skies. 'That was on behalf of our team. It was just a thank you for everything that he's given the game of cricket, and given English cricket, on and off the field,' he said. 'It's been amazing to recognise everything that he's done as a player, as a coach, as a mentor, as a friend to the dressing room and to the game. Joe Root salutes Graham Thorpe after reaching his century (Ben Whitley/PA) 'It was really great to see the amount of love that there is for him and for his family.' India's quicks had found wonderful rhythm before the weather intervened and would probably have liked to try and finish the job while the mood was with them. A night's break and an extra use of the heavy roller could play into England's hands but a saturated outfield meant the tourists were not complaining about the umpires' decision. 'We can see it's pretty wet out there,' said bowling coach Morne Morkel. 'In a way that's out of our control so all we can focus on is doing a good warm-up in the morning, get the boys ready to get the ball in the right area and create a little bit of excitement again.'
North Wales Chronicle
4 hours ago
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Chris Woakes ‘all in' and will bat with dislocated shoulder if needed
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4 hours ago
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At the Oval 20 years ago, England led 2-1 at the end of a wildly oscillating five-match series. In their second innings, the host's No 5 arrived at a fraught moment and then summoned an innings of swagger and dazzling skill. Kevin Pietersen's 158 against Australia will forever remain one of English cricket's most cherished Test innings: a monument of clean-striking chutzpah that regained the Ashes. At the same ground two decades on, Harry Brook produced a worthy encore. In the fourth innings, rather than the third as Pietersen was, Brook knew that the equation was simple. He arrived at 106-3; England would either score another 268 runs or be defeated. In 2005, Pietersen arrived with 16.1 overs until lunch; Brook's arrival came with just 10.3 overs until the same interval. Yet while Pietersen waited until the second session to unfurl his full assault, Brook saw no need to delay his attack. Brook's initial treatment of Akash Deep foreshadowed the violence to come. From his 19th ball, Brook pulled Deep off the front foot through midwicket. Now, Brook doubled down – charging down the wicket and drilling Deep over cover for six. In isolation, it was a staggering shot; the impact was amplified by the reality that England still needed another 244 runs to win. Twenty years ago, Pietersen was dropped at slip by Shane Warne, 15 runs into his epic 158. Brook, too, was abetted by early fortune. On 19, he pulled Prasidh Krishna into the hands of Mohammed Siraj at fine leg. But as Siraj snaffled the ball, his right leg clipped the boundary rope, earning Brook six runs. Harry Brook survives! 😱 Mohammed Siraj takes the catch but then stumbles over the boundary, it's a six! 😮 — Sky Sports Cricket (@SkyCricket) August 3, 2025 Yet if the underlying approaches, and a healthy dollop of luck, were common threads in these two Oval classics, there was one crucial difference. That day against Australia, Pietersen needed a pep-talk at lunch, from captain Michael Vaughan. to remind him of how to play. 'I was like, 'Oh my gosh, what am I going to do here?'' Pietersen later said. Vaughan told him to 'keep swinging'. This time, Brook had no such uncertainty. His entire Test career has come under the Brendon McCullum-Ben Stokes regime. All the while, he has been liberated to explore the full range of his talents. Pietersen did not always have such clarity. After Duncan Fletcher left as head coach, in 2007, Pietersen was often uncertain about how much risk England would tolerate in his Test batting. Notoriously, he was vociferously criticised in the changing room by batting coach Graham Gooch after being caught at long off at Perth in 2013. 'I got abused so much by the coaching staff for getting out caught on the boundary,' Pietersen told me recently. 'It was almost playing with a hand tied behind your back. A lot of people say, 'You would have loved playing under Brendon'.' In isolation, Brook's dismissal at the Oval looked as egregious as any in Pietersen's career. Revved-up, Brook backed away to the leg side and charged down the wicket to Deep. As he shaped to swipe Deep across the line, Brook lost control of his bat. The ball looped up to Siraj at extra cover, the bat to square leg: a scene of incompetence unbefitting for one of the world's best batsmen. This might yet be seen as the moment that England squandered control of the Test match. But England will not focus on the farcical end to Brook's innings. Instead, they will focus on the brutal brilliance that came before. Brook is a thrilling combination of the premeditated and instinctive. Such range allowed him by turns to use his feet to back away and carve Krishna over point, then to retain complete balance as he thrashed drives through the covers and plundered short balls off the front and back foot alike. Brook's 10th Test hundred, reorienting the game in 91 balls, might well have been his best yet. His unusually emotional celebration, leaping for joy, seemed to recognise as much. This 111 secured Brook's entry into an elite club, which has eluded even Steve Smith: of Test players who have made great fourth innings centuries. Until the Oval, Brook had floundered in the fourth innings, averaging only 18.9. Brook's counter-attack illustrated how No 5 has become the prime spot for a side's most destructive batsman. In an era when the new ball often offers appreciable movement, but then swiftly softens and becomes far more conducive for batting, Travis Head and Rishabh Pant both relish batting at five. Yet not even this pair have quite matched Brook so far in his Test career. Brook now averages 57.5 in 30 Tests. Only six men – Don Bradman, Herbert Sutcliffe, Ken Barrington, Everton Weekes, Wally Hammond and Garry Sobers – have played as many Tests and averaged more. And Brook has plundered runs with such regularity while scoring at a strike rate of 87, the fastest of anyone with 500 Test runs. Whatever the final day brings at the Oval, Brook's penchant for the exasperating should not obscure how extraordinary he is.
