The hype that is Ben Stokes

His bowling seems to be going backwards mainly due to recurring injuries. Might have to make a career choice soon whether he is an all rounder or a batsman. Telling that England always pick an extra bowler in the odi team when stokes plays.

Stokes is a bit overrated and a bit overhyped to be fair.

Not his fault he went for so much in the IPL though, he can't control that and I think a lot of it stems from that.

All rounders are in general highly sought after though nowadays, and he is one of the better ones out there.
Still a hell of a lot of room for improvement though.

There are more bona fide all rounders in the game than ever these days...& top quality too

Let's see what the ICC brings

http://www.ja606.co.uk/articles/viewArticle/369480

Fantasy cricket lads for Champions Trophy

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I really can't name any other better all rounder than Stokes? Maybe Matthews but hes hit and miss.

Aus/SA/NZ dont really have anyone.

I think the term has changed somewhat....you get batting fielder all rounders... batter keeper all rounders the amount of players who are so good at more than one discipline now has gone up tenfold ...

You could call Root an all rounder in principle including some very good slip catching and part time spin

Shahid Afridi was a quality allrounder in his prime. Abdul Razzaq was also pretty decent, In terms of current allrounders I can't really think of anyone that is amazing.

How has Ben been doing since this thread started?

Stokes has a higher batting average than Flintoff in every form of the game. He also has as many 100s in ODIs (3) and nearly as many 100s in Tests and First Class cricket (4 and 12 against 5 and 18), despite only being 26 years old.

He also has more five-wicket hauls in Tests and First Class cricket, although his bowling average is marginally worse in Tests and significantly worse in ODIs.

I think it's pretty uncontroversial to say that Flintoff was a better bowler than Stokes, but then he was a bowling all-rounder who batted at 6 because of a lack of alternatives, whereas Stokes is a batting all-rounder who bowls well as a 3rd or 4th seamer.

Point is, looking at the stats Stokes is going to comfortably outshine Flintoff, and I don't think anyone would claim that Flintoff wasn't a quality all-rounder, one of the best in the world at the time (Jacques Kallis was clearly better, but then Kallis has a good claim on best all-rounder of all time).

Stokes is class and is only improving all the time