Ben Stokes

[captaincolly]

Geez, that sure looks like Stokes and Hales on the video. If it is real, he not just won't tour, he may well end up in prison. No way that was self defence.

Of course, it may not be genuine - bit odd how it ended up in the Sun rather than in police hands. The wait goes on.

Yes, if that is genuine footage it looks very bad.

[Alviro Patterson]

Never thought i'd say this but Ben Stokes has gone up in my estimations. What else is he supposed to do when being threatend with a glass bottle?

[bigfluffylemon]

Never thought i'd say this but Ben Stokes has gone up in my estimations. What else is he supposed to do when being threatend with a glass bottle?

Run away? That's what I would have done. As a professional athlete, he should have easily been able to outpace a drunken yobbo.

[ddb]

https://streamable.com/r80mh

*modded* taht's bad

[sussexpob]

Never thought i'd say this but Ben Stokes has gone up in my estimations. What else is he supposed to do when being threatend with a glass bottle?

He initially seems to step in the middle of two people fighting, but after knocking the assailant to the floor, his behaviour then steps over the mark of any self-defence argument. He throws nearly 10 punches, including one vicious knockout blow, while the two guys are retreating and clearly trying to calm him down. And even before that, I can tell you right now having studied criminal law, under no circumstances will you ever convince anyone your being defensive while hitting someone on the floor.

[Alviro Patterson]

Never thought i'd say this but Ben Stokes has gone up in my estimations. What else is he supposed to do when being threatend with a glass bottle?

He initially seems to step in the middle of two people fighting, but after knocking the assailant to the floor, his behaviour then steps over the mark of any self-defence argument. He throws nearly 10 punches, including one vicious knockout blow, while the two guys are retreating and clearly trying to calm him down. And even before that, I can tell you right now having studied criminal law, under no circumstances will you ever convince anyone your being defensive while hitting someone on the floor.

Those two guys were happy enough to trade verbals whilst walking away. Doesn't look like the situation calmed down, otherwise Stokes would not have thrown that punch.

It's convenient how the video cuts short immediately after knocckout blow, what has happened after that?

[bigfluffylemon]

The telegraph website has a picture of the 5 taken during the night out in Bristol
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/cricket/2017 ... rest-live/

Stokes and Hales are clearly wearing the same clothes as the figures in the video that appear to be them from the face/hair features.

It looks pretty bad.

[Gingerfinch]

Looked like self defence at first, but his behaviour afterwards may see him lose his ashes place, though I somehow doubt it.

[meninblue]

From whatever i watched in video i think that someone was trying to punch or fight with another person and Ben stepped in. Does it matter whether the person who Ben was trying to save from being beaten was his friend or not. Ben did the right thing by protecting another weak person from being beaten by a man or two. In such situation there is no point by trying to call police. The other person may have died if Ben would not have stopped the aggressive people and alllowed them to thrash that person for next few minutes until police arrived. It was not self defense at start but it was about defending someone else. However later on it was some self defense as he was involved in a fight directly. I would not blame Ben for saving someone else. Yes, it has to be questioned why he was drinking late night outside in middle of a tour, however it was lucky for the unknown person that someone like Ben was present in that situation to save him.

[mikesiva]

What is it about allrounders? Beefy and Freddie had similar issues with the booze. Does becoming an effective fast-bowling allrounder require the sort of larger-than-life personality that continually gets you into trouble off the field? It does seem to be a mainly English and Australian phenomenon - I don't recall Imran, Kapil, Hadlee or Kallis having these sort of issues (but I may be a bit young for the former three).

Nine of these ten players turned out for Ashes countries....

https://www.sportskeeda.com/slideshow/c ... to-alcohol

The thing is, Ponting recognised he had a problem, and he changed his lifestyle.

Will Stokes?

or will he go the way of Symonds and Ryder?

[Arthur Crabtree]

Apart from ZBGB, all those players were suspended. Strauss' comment is that the management is there to support Stokes, so the tone and substance is considerably different.

[yuppie]

How can Stokes be defended here? No one knows what happened before this point. Stokes might well have been the instigator of all this. He might also have been the one on the recieving end. But his actions were innapropirate.

To watch him follow two people walking away from him and knock one out whilst they were not defending themselves is inexusable. They appeared to be trying to calm him down.

I can not see how he wont be charged, and i can not see how he can play in the Ashes.

The man is a thug, and he would do well to phone Ponting and ask him what he did to change his life around.

[Arthur Crabtree]

I don't have an opinion on the incident because I haven''t seen it and no one who wasn't there can have a view on the context of the events.

But while the investigation goes on I'm inclined to think he should go on leave from his England duties.

As alluded to above, the contrast with how KP was treated is unmissable. Pietersen still doesn't know why his England career was halted and then ended on the inclination of Strauss. Now Strauss says that the England management are there to support Ben. I hope the ECB re-evaluates its conduct in 2014 in this context.

[budgetmeansbudget]

Was that Alex Hales stood behind him at the end of the video?

No one really knows what happened before the fight started, but if the guy was threatening someone with a bottle then he deserved to be knocked out.

Stokes clearly lost it, but why he lost it is the big issue here.

Yuppie says he's a thug, but that only applies if he started it, not if he was reacting to a threat by another individual.

[alfie]

I don't have an opinion on the incident because I haven''t seen it and no one who wasn't there can have a view on the context of the events.

But while the investigation goes on I'm inclined to think he should go on leave from his England duties.

As alluded to above, the contrast with how KP was treated is unmissable. Pietersen still doesn't know why his England career was halted and then ended on the inclination of Strauss. Now Strauss says that the England management are there to support Ben. I hope the ECB re-evaluates its conduct in 2014 in this context.

I know you will never give up seeking Justice for KP , Arthur...but really ; this has got nothing in common with the decision to end his England career. Right or wrong , that was essentially a cricketing decision - not wickets and runs alone , perhaps ; but conduct and loyalties ...and certainly not a case I wish to argue again.
This is an unrelated incident : no different from any person getting into trouble while on his own time and not directly affecting his employer. Which does not , of course , mean that employer isn't entitled to act if they consider such behavior has either affected their ability to do the job , or reflected badly on the organization...
There is certainly a case for the ECB to consider. But it has nothing to do with KP.