Stokes determined to right some of England's wrongs in the West Indies

While England’s batsmen blundered their way around Australia and New Zealand, seemingly unable to come to terms with the seismic shift in cricketing philosophy that was unfolding in front of their eyes, Stokes, widely acknowledged as one of the biggest hitters in the English game, was easing his way through pre-season with Durham. Rarely can so much talent have been utilised so ineffectively.

The wrong will partly be put right when Stokes flies to the West Indies this morning as part of a Test squad that has been charged with the task of kick-starting the process of rebuilding English cricket, but it is hard to avoid the conclusion that it is all too little, too late.

“It was obviously disappointing because it was such a big thing,” said Stokes of his World Cup snub, with considerable understatement. “It was a World Cup, and everyone wants to try to be involved in that. To be left out was disappointing, but you’ve probably got to take some disappointment in the line of work that we’re in.”

Tellingly though, when asked to comment on the radical shift that saw scores of 350-plus become commonplace on the batsmen-friendly wickets of Oceania, he added: “It wasn’t a surprise to see that type of cricket being played.

“Even in the domestic game, where we play 40 overs, teams are still getting 300 now. So for international teams not to have been getting to 300 in 50 overs would have been a big surprise.

“In the past, 300 would have been a good total, but now it’s probably just about a par score in international cricket. You really want to be looking at getting to 340 or 350.

“The game has changed so much. Even ten years ago, a normal score was probably 200. The game is always developing, and every team is producing these players who can change a game.”

The difference, he might have added, is that other teams don’t leave those players at home when the most important tournament in the global calendar comes around.

Hindsight tells you that Stokes’ omission from England’s World Cup squad was a monumental error, but then as much was apparent to most when he blasted 77 off 37 balls on his Big Bash debut prior to the tournament, before smashing an unbeaten 151 to help England Lions win their one-day series in South Africa.

Defenders of the selection decision, and to be fair there are some, point to Stokes’ international record as proof of his fallibility at the highest level. He has only twice topped 30 in 19 ODI innings, and went on a run of six ducks in the space of ten international innings last year.

The 23-year-old freely admits his form deserted him in series against the West Indies, India and Sri Lanka, but his cause was hardly helped by a constant shuffling around the order that saw him batting everywhere from numbers three to eight.

That will surely change in the West Indies, with Stokes set to fill the number six or seven slot that is best suited to his strengths as an explosive game-changing batsman and a deceptively quick bowler.

“Looking at the squad, then number six or seven is probably somewhere I’d want to be,” he said. “Ideally, I’d like to play a similar role to the one I did in the Ashes. With the squad that’s heading out to the West Indies, there’s a big opportunity for me to do that.

“I don’t see any reason why I can’t get back to the level I was at in the Ashes. I know in myself that I can do it, and I don’t think I’ve become a worse player since then, I just haven’t managed to quite deliver that standard.”

But will his style be suited to the Test game?  A decade ago, you would probably have said not, but with the attitudinal shift apparent in Twenty20 having cascaded down into the 50-over game, it would surely be naive to expect Test cricket to remain an oasis of calm amid the gathering tumult.

There is an expectation that Test scoring rates will head on a steep upward curve in the next couple of years, and if England are to be at the vanguard of that change, rather than playing catch up, they will surely have to trust in the likes of Stokes and Jos Buttler, who is set to be next to him in the batting order.

“I think you’ll see some of the changes moving over into the Test game,” he said. “If you look at most Test lower orders now, you’re seeing a lot more aggressive players who want to dominate the game.

“England have had Matt Prior over the last six or seven years, and with his strike rate and the way he can change a game, he’s been very important. Jos has filled his place, and he does exactly the same.

“In the next two or three years, you’ll probably see some more exciting Test cricket than has been the case in the last four or five. Not in terms of results, just in terms of the speed of the scoring and the way the game is being played. The way one-day cricket is being played now will roll over into Tests, and I think we’ve got the personnel for that.

“We’ve had a lot of criticism because of results over the last year, but we definitely have the personnel to have a really good team.”