England captain Ben Stokes reiterated his stance about not having injury substitutes in cricket, despite his teammate Chris Woakes being at the receiving end this time around. Stokes had mentioned at Old Trafford when asked after the drawn Test if there was an argument in favour of injury substitutes, with respect to Rishabh Pant, who suffered a toe fracture on the first day of the fourth Test against England, that there'd be too many loopholes to cover and injury fakes and things like that might blur the lines between which one is real and which one's not.
Stokes admitted that it was probably the sod's law that it happened to his team in the series decider, right after he said it last week, but maintained that substitutes shouldn't be allowed. "I don’t see it being a thing.
"Sorry about this, but if somebody gets injured: tough s***," Stokes added, while elaborating his point further with an example of his injury. Stokes missed out on the Oval Test because of a shoulder injury but mentioned that if there was a substitute option, he might have played to maybe exploit and manipulate the rule.
"I could’ve gone into this with a sore shoulder [saying] ‘I’ll give it a go, hopefully I’ll come through, but if I don’t then somebody comes in’. [Then] you select a team tactically and I think you could manipulate it. The injury ruled me out of this game.
"Maybe if we had this option [of subs], I could’ve said, ‘I know it’s not worth it, but if I do go down, somebody can come in’. I couldn’t risk this. If I go down in the game, it ruins the makeup of the team. I’m still heavily against it. It’s just sod’s law it happened a week after I said it," he added.
Stokes commended Woakes for his courage to walk out to bat when England required 17 runs to win the Oval Test with just one wicket remaining, despite being in excruciating pain while walking out to bat and running between the wickets with his left arm in a sling. Woakes suffered a dislocation of his shoulder on the opening day of the fifth Test while diving to save a run on the boundary. However, it resulted in Woakes getting ruled out of the remainder of the Test match and reports suggested that the Ashes could be in danger for the veteran all-rounder as well.
