We Have Been Far Too Lenient For Far Too Long

On the face of it, there may not seem much of a connection between the car crash of the Alex Hales affair and a totally unrelated event that took place in the England dressing room at the Kensington Oval in mid-March 2014, but bear with me.

Back then, you may recall, the hugely talented but “fiery” Ben Stokes reacted to his first-ball dismissal by Krishmar Santokie in their T20 match against West Indies by punching a locker door so hard that he ended up suffering a fractured scaphoid in his right hand, an injury it was confirmed almost immediately would rule him out of England’s plans for the World T20 in Bangladesh.

In the immediate aftermath, the Durham all-rounder expressed suitable levels of contrition.

“I am really disappointed to be missing out on going to a World T20 with England,” Stokes was quoted as saying. “It was a huge error in judgment following a frustrating tour for me and I deeply regret my behaviour.”

The trashing of dressing rooms has been the stuff of cricket legend since time began, of course, as have any number of incidents resulting in unintentional harm done by the perpetrator to self, furniture, windows, teacups, protective equipment, bats and, occasionally, team-mates or other innocent bystanders.

But Stokes had form, most recently when he was sent home in disgrace from the Lions tour to Australia little more than year earlier for continuing to live it up, even after having received a written warning for “contravening conduct obligations”.

Which is why, while most of those involved in running England’s affairs were of the opinion that the current matter should be allowed to rest there and Stokes be invited to consider his future without further sanction, one prominent member of the management team made it clear he favoured further strong action against the player not only to consider what a mug he was but also “pour encourager les autres”, strong action as in a ban.