England captain Stokes looks lean and mean as he opens up on knee surgery

HYDERABAD — Ben Stokes looks more soldier than cricketer, ready for battle not the middle.

His physique is lean and hard, his skin stretched tight across gaunt facial features. He is at least a stone lighter since the Cricket World Cup in October, maybe a stone and a half. This is the reconstituted England skipper, rehabilitated and ready to go, at least with the bat, after surgery to his troublesome knee.

As ever, the ultimate test of his fitness will be on the greensward.

Stokes had a bone spur removed and repairs to his meniscus. The swelling had reached a critical point, leaving no alternative but the knife. As he acknowledged, surgery is a speculative business, which in some cases concludes with a full stop.

Though Stokes did not fear for his career, he understood the dangers.

“I’ve not given too much away with my knee stuff over the last couple of years. It’s not like you have surgery and you are immediately better. Surgery is always the last option.

“Surgeries can go very well but they can also sometimes not go too well, and set people back even further, and potentially even end careers. Throughout the whole process, it was chatting with the medical team, the surgeon himself. As long as I felt I could do my job to a certain extent, we were always pushing surgery back as long as we could.

“But after the World Cup, in terms of how my knee was by the end, and the swelling that came out, that was a danger sign for the surgeon, and it was definitely time to have the surgery.

“Since the op it’s been breaking down each bit. First it’s getting rid of the swelling. Then it was monitoring how it was going every two or three days, then progressing more into movement and getting confidence back.

“Once we got to Abu Dhabi it was a good time to be pressing things on a bit, and start pushing myself, seeing how I was reacting, how I was waking up each day, how I was getting through long hard sessions, three or four different things through the day. I’ve taken a lot of confidence out of the two weeks.”

Stokes has not begun to address a return to bowling. He has not bowled a ball competitively since the Ashes Test at Lord’s six months ago. Should the knee hold up over the first few Tests as expected here he might send a few down in the nets or even in the middle with a view to returning to the all-rounder role in the summer.

That’s the dream scenario. For now he is inching towards full fitness one psychological barrier at a time.

“As good as the training camp in Abu Dhabi was, I also found a few frustrating moments.

“Subconsciously, I was sort of doing what I was doing before I had it, just because it’s almost like muscle memory to maybe not get into certain positions. But the more I batted, the more I found actually, it’s way more comfortable now.

“I can do it. It just comes through training. I sort of don’t think about it.

“Getting into this period before the game starts, you’re thinking about the game whereas the first couple of nets I had I was more like testing the waters, maybe not committing myself as much as I would do in a game. But that all comes from coming back from the surgery. Just testing the waters.

“Now my mind is focused on the game. I don’t have those thoughts in my mind. I’m proud of how hard that I’ve worked to get into this position. And actually probably ahead of schedule so I hope that I don’t have any more problems going forward.”