The 33-year old Ben Stokes has been ruled out of the upcoming Test series against Sri Lanka due to a torn hamstring which happened during a domestic game on Tuesday. He suffered the injury while batting for Northern Superchargers where he was later seen on the crutches.

It is a major blow for England as he’ll be missing all the three tests against Sri Lanka which are supposed to commence from August 21.

The scan which was conducted revealed the extent of damage, with Stokes now unable to play Ollie Pope will be taking the charge of captaincy, he has remained the vice captain for over a year. The ECB in a statement mentioned that Stokes will be looking forward to his return in the England squad for Test tour against Pakistan, which will be starting on October 7.

“The allrounder is aiming to return for England’s winter test tour of Pakistan,” England said in a statement.

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Zak Crawley will also be missing the Sri Lanka series due to finger injury and will be aiming to comeback for the Test series against Pakistan.

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England is yet to name the replacement for Ben Stokes in the Sri Lanka series. Jordan Cox is also in contention to make his Test debut, Jamie Smith and Chris Woakes are the other contenders who can be picked for No.6 and 7.

Ollie Pope’s captaincy experience is quite limited to a single first-class natch, leading Surrey against Glamorgan in September 2021, he also succeeded Chris Jordan and took the reins for the 2024 Vitality Blast Campaign. Pope has also captained England XIs in warm-up matches in UAE ahead of 2022 Pakistan tour and in New Zealand at the start of 2023, where Ben Stokes had opted to sit out.

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