Ollie Pope passes first captaincy test, though his own returns beg to differ
Caretaker’s challenge should not be under-estimated, especially against dogged opponents
Vithushan Ehantharajah24-Aug-2024Not everyone wins their first Test as England men’s Test captain. Not even Ben Stokes.The great saviour of English cricket had an ignominious first go at the big job four years ago. Stepping in for Joe Root, who was expecting his second child, Stokes was on the receiving end of a four-wicket defeat to West Indies at the start of the Covid-19 summer.The lesson here is: it does not matter if you win your first Test. But as Ollie Pope finished shaking hands with the Sri Lanka players and support staff after England had triumphed by five wickets, there was a palpable sense of relief.Victory had taken longer than expected. On day three, both when Sri Lanka were 95 for 4 (27 behind) and 190 for 6 (68 ahead) in their second innings, the end looked nigh. But it was only at 7.18pm on day four, as Pope put his cap back on, tugging it firmly onto his head, that he seemed at ease.Not that this peace lasted long. No sooner had Shoaib Bashir put his arm around him in congratulations, Pope was whisked away for the usual captaincy media duties. He did not mind them, though England captains never do after wins, especially this early into the gig. Thanks to Jamie Smith’s first-innings century and a breezy 39 that lanced the remaining jeopardy from a chase of 205, Pope did not have to talk about himself all that much.For a contest in which England were never really chasing the game, this was the most challenging of four days. It asked of Pope more than he had probably expected to give. There was frustration with Kamindu Mendis’ century and Dinesh Chandimal’s combination of bravery and bloody-mindedness, while the loss of Mark Wood to a thigh injury proved a gross inconvenience considering he had sent Chandimal to the hospital 24 hours before he was heading there for his own scan.Pope fell cheaply in the second innings, reverse-sweeping to slip•Stu Forster/Getty ImagesShorn of a gunslinger that had blown away West Indies’ tail a month earlier, faced with an ever-growing partnership – and target – on a worn pitch that was no friend of batters but even less so of bowlers, Pope had a problem.In that sort of situation, on a slow deck nullifying any lateral movement from the seamers, Stokes tends to bring out the bouncer plan. Hammering a length, fielders spread out far and in close, persisting belligerently as the traditionalists bemoan an empty slip cordon. “If you’ve got the men out, all it is is one tiny mistake where it catches the top half of the bat and goes to the man,” explained Pope of the logic.Unsurprisingly, the stand-in did as the captain would have done. But not for long. Just nine of the 141 deliveries England bowled on the final day were outright short balls, with a further 55 short of a length. Pope gave it a go, but soon realised that Kamindu and Chandimal were actually revelling in it. So, he called it quits.”I was kind of hoping they would just take on every ball and try and pull every ball and eventually one would go to hand,” Pope said. “But they played nicely, they selected which balls they wanted to take on, ducked well. Credit to them for that and that’s probably why we didn’t take it for so long and thought we’d try and play for a few more that scuttle through and go under the bat. But it [the pitch] didn’t quite deteriorate enough to do that.”Sensing the importance of the new ball that would come into play after 80 overs, Pope brought on Matthew Potts and Shoaib Bashir from the 70th over onwards to opt for a fuller, tighter line. And while Kamindu took advantage of the hardness of the new ball to move to three figures, the left-hander was eventually snared with an edge off a good length by Gus Atkinson. Not only was a stand of 117 broken, but it was the first of the final four wickets to fall in the space of 26 balls.Pope dons his blazer in his first Test as England captain•Getty ImagesRoot, who went on to see the chase home, was suitably impressed with Pope.”It wasn’t straightforward,” Root said, having himself captained England in a record 64 Tests. “It was a few different things that you’d have to contend with. It wasn’t your typical English kind of Test match, so hats off to him.”He was very good at changing things up, trying different things, and constantly trying to move the game in the right direction. So again, another step in the way that we want to go as a team. And for us to do it slightly differently this week and still find a way to win is a really good sign for us.”Pope’s batting, however, was the only sour note in what, by and large, was a solid first outing with the armband. On day two, Asitha Fernando bagged his off stump for six. On day four, Pope gave his wicket away in a manner that gave credit to his opposite number.Dhananjaya de Silva had asked left-arm spinner Prabath Jayasuriya to bowl over the wicket to the right-hander. The aim was to frustrate and, in turn, elicit a dud shot. Pope obliged with a botched reverse sweep that fell into the hands of first slip for another score of six.Dhananjaya celebrated exactly as you’d expect; glee across his face, letting anyone and everyone know it was his plan that had come good. Pope, rueful at the time, was not all that dismayed at the end. “It’s an option I like to take,” he explained, as his remarkable century at the start of the year in Hyderabad showed. “Unfortunately it didn’t come off today.”Related
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More broadly, however, he happened upon something to rectify; how to switch from being a captain who thinks about the team to a batter who thinks about himself in the instant between marshalling on the field and preparing to bat at No.3. And do it instinctively.”I think that’s probably one thing I can take from this Test – making sure I’m captain when I’m in the field and around it, but when it’s batting time, it’s batting.”I prepared in the same way. But probably from a mindset point of view, that’s just a little learning for me, that I can just draw a line once we’re off the field, get my pads on and that’s my time to focus on myself because that’s what’s best for the team.”It cannot have been easy for Pope to captain as he would have wanted, even if it was just maintaining the status quo, given that Stokes was still in the dressing-room. Even though Stokes and head coach Brendon McCullum were on hand for any pep talks requested during the intervals, Pope had to strike a balance between being a surrogate and just being himself.All in all, he seemed to have managed that pretty well. And maybe the best reflection of that was Stokes’s general restlessness. “I think he was bored at times,” Pope said with a smile. “I think he’d much rather be playing.”It would have helped that the team he was leading had a very different feel and age profile. There were only three survivors in this XI from the one that beat South Africa in Manchester two years ago. Half of those changes are down to a combination of injuries to Stokes and Zak Crawley, and the retirements of Stuart Broad and James Anderson. But this is a team quietly regenerating.”It’s kind of funny,” Pope said, “when you look around every now and again on the bus, you’re like “geez, this is a proper young team’.”For two more games, a 26-year-old will look to scope England’s short-term future. It might only be one Test win in a “tenure” with only two weeks to run. But Pope is already playing a vital role in moulding a team that, once Stokes is no longer around, he might yet call his own.