Ben stock has recently completed 100 tests, but more importantly has completing almost 4 years as a captain. Although he is another in the list of losing captain in India, his achievements and standing as an outstanding Captain is not in doubt. So many who have assumed cricket’s top job, and for that matter in life too, have simply wanted the status. Most fell short of either the standing or smarts to do it as intended. Even fewer had the boldness to regard it as a position that could effect change in a team’s philosophy and the individual players’ career under their care. And even fewer have cared to nurture the career of those under their care.

On July 6, 2020, Ben Stokes walked out as England’s test team captain for first time against West Indies. He was a stand in due to injury to then Captain Joe Root and promptly lost the test. On that morning as he went over to fetch his England blazer for his first photoshoot as England captain, he noticed a sheet of paper affixed to the hanger. It was a hand-written message from the previous captain and his buddy Joe Root: “Do it your way”. And true to the word and typical of the man, for all his achievements, stanzas and missteps through an 11-year career, captaincy might be top of the list of things done Ben Stokes’ way.

While Stokes’ ascent to the captaincy may only be the latest chapter in his journey of 100 Tests, already it is the most important part of the narrative. It has drawn on every moment that has gone before – the good, the bad and the downright ugly – and repackaged the learnings as if to access, as it were, a higher state of consciousness. He has molded his team in an image of himself which thrives under pressure and pulls off miracles routinely. How does one compete against a team whose only palpable reaction to pressure is joy? It’s a challenge that all of England’s opponents, India included, are still getting their heads around. India has won the series, but England remains the most exciting team to watch. Losing to India in India is no shame, more celebrated team have done so.

No one has endured a more chequered journey to the summit of Captaincy than Stokes – a man whose extraordinary highs have been accompanied by a series of existentially significant lows.

Defeats and Humiliation have not fazed him, like his experience in the 2016 World T20 final in Kolkata, when Carlos Brathwaite climbed through his guileless death over to slot four consecutive sixes and deliver a stunning victory for West Indies. That humiliation would have crushed lesser players. But not Stokes

Around 5 years ago, Stokes was involved in a brawl outside a nightclub in Bristol. He was arrested for punching two men on the street in front of numerous witnesses and the whole incident was captured on CCTV camera. He subsequently stood trial and was banned for 8 matches, missing the Ashes of 2017-18 (which Australia won). He was subsequently acquitted a year later and then reinstated in the English team.

Stokes has always shied away from an over-analysis of the Bristol incident, nor has he knowingly used the word “redemption” to explain his extraordinary drive in the years that followed his acquittal, but there’s surely no moment that cuts more deeply into Stokes’ psyche.

I am reminded of the 2018 summer when he bowled his heart out against India for one of those trademark three-wicket bursts to break open India’s resistance and seal a thrilling 31-run win on the fourth and final morning of the match. Memorable because that spell might also have marked the final morning of Stokes’ Test career. Two days later, he would be standing trial at Bristol Crown Court, with the very real threat of a prison sentence hanging over him. As the cameras caught up with him on the edge of the pitch moments after the victory, his emotionally spent utterances expressed beyond all doubt what he stood to lose. “I don’t know what to be feeling right now…” he said. “Playing for England means so much.”

There was unequivocal proof of the importance of the struggle to Stokes, and insofar as when it really mattered, the following two years produced the absolute zenith of his career – just shy of 2000 runs at 43.00 including four centuries, plus 60 wickets at 27.43 and of course his starring role in the 2019 World Cup triumph. When, at Old Trafford ground in July 2020, he single-handedly squared the series against West Indies with twin scores of 176 and 78 not out, the latter as an opener and from just 57 balls in a fast-forwarded declaration push, his redemption arc seemed to be complete. He was the best Allrounder in the world and genuinely looked ready to become the best Test batter in the world.

But then, Covid kicked in, and the speed with which Stokes’ equilibrium crumbled was both shocking and instructive in equal measure. First came the slow death of his father Ged from brain cancer. An insidious disease taking hold on the other side of the world in New Zealand, which understandably caused Stokes to question his priorities at a time when England’s cricketers were going above and beyond to keep Cricket alive in their bio-secure bubbles. And then, after his tentative return in India the following year, came his badly broken finger, sustained during an IPL fixture soon after the tour, that left him unable to grip his bat and fearing, with full justification, that his career would never recover.

That he has bounced back and performed at the level he has, could have propelled him to a pedestal where he could do now wrong. Instead, he chose to take up leadership as a challenge and has done it his way. Ask anyone to name a memorable Stokes moment and it’ll likely have come prior to the last 22 months. Therein lies the crux of his leadership. With his legacy already set in stone, captaincy was an exciting new challenge, with nothing to lose.

One of his earliest statements as a Captain best epitomizes his tenure. “I’m at a stage now where I would much prefer to leave a mark on other people’s careers than look to make mine more established. I’ve played a lot of cricket and done some great things with some great teams over the years. Being captain now, I’ve got a real desire to make the best out of the team that I’ve got, and the players who will come in the future.” It was a statement of unusually altruistic intent, but also of extreme self-awareness – and one that has been borne out by his team’s subsequent displays. It is an admirable trait to hold dear, no doubt informed by time in the ranks and the tribulations of a career worthy of celebration before he became captain. It’s not a new trait either. Even before he was captain, Stokes was adamant that the growth of the England Test team could not be achieved without the stepping up of its apparently lesser lights. At Cape Town in 2020 for instance, after another Stokes three-wicket gut-buster had ripped England to a thrilling final-session win against South Africa, he was adamant that his player-of-the-match award should go to the now forgotten, Dom Sibley, the man whose maiden England hundred had set up the victory shot in the first place.

Therin lies his ability to get the most out of his inexperienced charges. The stepping up of the men around him has led to stepping up of England as a whole. And to prove that that point he was ready to sacrifice those very same career stats for which Stokes the player had split his gut to achieve but Stokes the Captain could not care less. Evident from the manic early months of Baz ball, when he deployed himself as a batter of last resort, as something close to a sacrificial madman, swinging blindly from the hip as if to prove that personal gain was irrelevant in this new team ethos.

On the Eve of his 100th test Stokes said, “I think since becoming captain, one of the main things I enjoy is that every day I wake up and have a great opportunity to progress people’s careers,” The statement shows his incredible empathy towards his charges. Today he has freed his team from the pressures of expectation. And despite his caring two hoots for his stats his batting average is more than two runs per innings better as a captain, while his bowling average has slipped below 32 despite his dodgy knee limiting him to five wickets since the end of the 2022 summer.

Stokes can now wear this as extreme validation of the emotions that the rookies around him will be feeling when it’s their turn to perform under pressure. Much as he was able to tell Jofra Archer “this will not define your career” as Archer prepared to bowl the 2019 Super Over, so the likes of Hartley and Shoaib Bashir have benefitted from the knowledge that the worst that could possibly happen to them has happened to a person who is not only walking tall among them, but calling every shot. Each man in Stokes’ midst is now empowered by the permission he grants them to go out and be today’s hero. And to deliver the only statistics that really count in the end. A win.

We have witnessed Stoke’s life and death theatrics on the field to the times he has sacrificed his wicket to prove a point. Somewhere between those two extremes lies the truth that Stokes has demonstrated to his charges. That playing cricket at the highest level is an extraordinary privilege that offers its participants the very best that life can offer, but it is not life and death itself.

And so, here Stokes is playing beyond his 100th Test, having never actively coveted the role but nailing all its most important aspects. In doing so, he is setting himself apart as the best to ever do it. Somehow, Stokes the captain is eclipsing Stokes the player.