It's a luxury to have Ben Stokes: Eoin Morgan

The ghost from the past will no longer be around, assures England allrounder Ben Stokes, as he put on a match-winning performance against India in the 3rd ODI at Kolkata. Stokes hammered an unbeaten 57 off 39 balls, powered by four boundaries and two sixes, and also picked up three crucial wickets. England registered their maiden win in this tour with a five-run victory.

In the post-match press conference, Stokes was asked if he feels any better now having come back to the ground where his dream was shattered and transpired as the worst nightmare. He said, This is just a win on its own terms. Like you said, (that) was nine months ago, the memories of that have gone. There was a bit of a bouncer flying around there during the warm-up days, not here, good for the lads. But yeah, it’s nice to come back here and get rid of bad memories of that game. As I said, it was another game of cricket to focus on and nice to get a win here.”

England limited-overs skipper Eoin Morgan was full of praises for the allrounder who has really established himself across all the formats in the last couple of years. “I reckon he’s more in the tank. He’s an incredible player to have in the side, I always say it’s a luxury to have a player like him in your team. He gives you everything he got on the day, which is a lot. And we don’t take that for granted.” Morgan said.

Stokes had an over left in hand but rather thank holding him for the 49th or the 50th over Morgan got done with him in the 48th over. But the English skipper said it wasn’t intentional to keep him away from the last over but they needed him to bowl that over which eventually got them the wicket of Hardik Pandya.

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“No, not at all. So I was actually thinking of bowling him two in a row and bowling him out because he bowled a great over and got the wicket of Hardik Pandya. But sort of went back and took a bit of gamble and came off a little bit. Some days they work, some days they don’t.

“The bowlers made everything we did today look really good, which they do all the time. It’s great to see them bowl today, and compared to the first two games, there was lot of improvement which is very important and on top of a successful win, particularly given how damp it was, how wet the ball was, and playing against a strong side, I think it hold a lot of weight.” He concluded.