Farewell the Trumpets

CP mourns Bazball

Dignity in defeat, is it? Makes me sick.

For years, this England team has been myopic. Steadfast to their approach in shutting out the noise and believing that their way, however controversial, nonsensical and at times moronic, was the way. It was intoxicating.

That changed after Brisbane.

Before, Ben Stokes had implored his men to remove the fear of failure. “We’re in the entertainment business,” Joe Root told Nathan Lyon during the 2023 Ashes. But following defeat two years later at the Gabba, the rhetoric changed. Stokes implored his men to “fight”, and that his changing room was no place for “weak men”.

The result in Adelaide was the same: they lost, comfortably. But they lost to the standards of societal norms. Nicking off politely rather than being caught aggressively.

Great book, this