Australia won their first encounter with “Bazball” when they defeated England in the Ashes Test at Edgbaston last week (June 16-20, 2023). It was a nail-biter of a game and could have gone either way. But more than the result, it is about how Test cricket is going to be played in the future. England’s Bazball strategy is revolutionary and exhilarating. It is also about the fundamental philosophy of any sport in the media-saturated 21st century.
For those who came in late, Bazball is a term invented last year after former New Zealand captain Brendon McCullum, nicknamed Baz, took over as head coach of the England team with Ben Stokes as captain, and completely re-invented the team’s beliefs, attitudes and culture.
Also read: ‘Bazball' is an old concept, England are just packaging it better: Deep Dasgupta
England had been passing through a distressingly lean stretch—only one win in 17 Tests—and Joe Root had resigned his captaincy, saying that he could not take the stress any more. Drawing from the way teams play One-day internationals and T20s, McCullum and Stokes decided on a uniquely attacking form of Test cricket, where players are encouraged to play freely and without fear, stay focused only on a win—not even consider the possibility of a draw—and the most radical thing of all, enjoy themselves. That is, play like you did when you were a kid, to win and to have fun.
The results have been stunning and the cricket world is agog. England has won 11 of the 14 Tests they have played since adopting Bazball. Till the Edgbaston game, Stokes’ England had scored at 4.65 runs an over, unprecedented in Test history for any captain whose team has batted for more than 10,000 balls. In almost three-quarters of all Test wins ever, the victors have batted for at least 140 overs in the match. Of the 11 Tests that Bazball England has won, they have batted for more than 140 overs only once. They bat aggressively, which gives the bowlers more time to bowl the opposition out.
From 1877 until the end of 2020, 549 fourth-innings targets between 250 and 400 were set in Test cricket and only 10.92 percent were won by the chasing team. Stokes’ England have chased such targets in five Tests and won four of them (80 percent). The only Test it lost, against New Zealand, it lost by…one run.
McCullum and Stokes have questioned almost everything that was taken as an axiom in Test cricket. Even the dowdy institution of the nightwatchman has been redesignated “nighthawk”. He goes out there not to prod around apologetically but with a clear mission. Slog, because we were not counting on you to score runs in any case—“Get 30 off 10 or nought off one. Don’t waste a single ball.” It suddenly makes so much sense.
In fact, Bazball should be a management case study on how to rethink everything with a positive and winning attitude. Test cricket, possibly the most complex sport ever invented (chess and Go are games, not sports), can provide many valuable lessons on how to handle anything in life. If I had the power, I would make The Art of Captaincy by legendary England captain Mike Brearley a mandatory textbook in all business schools.
Of course, everyone who follows cricket was waiting to see how Bazball fares against Australia, the world Test champions. Australia have drawn first blood. But there are still four Tests to go in the series and after the Edgbaston loss, Stokes made it clear that he is not going to change his approach.
Stokes declared England’s first innings at 393-8, with Root batting fluently on 118, less than half an hour before close of play on the first day. This was surprising, but as my friend Jaideep Varma has explained in a long Facebook post, the declaration was bold but logical. One, England could have a go at the Australian batsmen, who had fielded all day long, in the dying moments of the day. Two, the Oval pitch was a batting paradise and the only period when the bowlers could get some purchase was during a day’s first session. So why waste time on the morning of the second day to score some 25 runs, which would make little difference? Have a go at the Australian batsmen for the full pre-lunch session.
And Stokes was correct. Australia were soon 67 for 3. As Varma says, “If England had not declared, they wouldn't have given themselves a chance of getting three or four Aussie wickets before the pitch flattened out and their bowlers started to toil (the rest of the day yielded 254-2).” In fact, if England had not declared, the match may have ended in a dreary draw—Australian batsmen would have come in perhaps an hour into the second day and calmly piled on the runs. The principles of Bazball consider playing for a draw the gravest of all sins. Because, in the end, players get paid by their fans, who do not buy tickets or switch on the TV to watch a boring drawn game.
Stokes has said many times that a prime duty of a cricketer is to entertain. This idea would shock purists, but he is right. If cricketers and cricket boards wish to keep Test cricket alive, they have to make matches more lively. In fact, Bazball has dramatically raised viewership of cricket whenever England plays. This gives cricket administrations all over the world more money to make the sport fairer and better in every way.
Bazball is a transformative idea. “We want to create a legacy in Test cricket,” Stokes has said. He may have already achieved that, in just 14 months. But it may take several years and a complete change of guard before the Indian team adapts. For evidence, we only need to look at the World Test Championship final that was played a fortnight ago, where Australia blew India away—the selection of the 16-member team, the selection of the playing 11 and the tactics used on the field. We can only hope that India seizes the day soon.
What is the worst that can happen? We will lose. But we will lose with honour and help Test cricket—the highest form of the game—stay vibrant.
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