Former captain Jos Buttler stars for England in T20 victory over the West Indies
Brook has made it clear he views his predecessor as the best white-ball batter in the world and Buttler made good on that billing, with England building a total of 188 for six and an advantage they refused to squander.
Dawson ensured his work did not go to waste, marking his return after almost three years in the international wilderness with an outstanding four for 20 as the tourists managed 167 for nine.
The PERFECT start to the series 👌
Victory in Durham ✅Game two in Bristol 🔜
Match Centre: https://t.co/LDkylcYeB5 pic.twitter.com/Mc56WuXDBJ
— England Cricket (@englandcricket) June 6, 2025
The 35-year-old's left-arm spin has been deemed surplus to requirements since 2022 but his consistently impressive returns at Hampshire have earned him a belated second chance and he took it greedily at the Banks Homes Riverside.
England roared out of the traps, Jamie Smith smiting the second ball of the match down the ground, then helping himself to two more boundaries before Jason Holder's first over was done.
Romario Shepherd nipped Ben Duckett out with a slower ball at the other end but that success came with strings attached – ushering Buttler to the crease with the majority of the powerplay still in front of him.
He made enthusiastic use of the fielding restrictions, launching into a tirade. He flicked between two distinct modes of attack – hitting long, hard and straight or bamboozling his opponent with reverse sweeps and ramps.
England took 45 off 12 legal deliveries in the fifth and sixth overs, Smith heaving Andre Russell over the ropes twice before Buttler tucked into Alzarri Joseph with abandon. Joseph, theoretically the high-speed enforcer of the attack, was thoroughly de-fanged as Buttler struck three sixes and a four in successive deliveries.
Commendable effort with the ball to restrict the hosts. 🏏
189 to take a series lead. #ENGvWI | #MenInMaroon pic.twitter.com/yhXPA1eOoS
— Windies Cricket (@windiescricket) June 6, 2025
Gudakesh Motie applied the brakes with some smart spin bowling, hustling through four overs for 21, and the pressure helped his team make inroads. Smith (38) failed to clear the deep-midwicket fielder, Brook got his footwork wrong as Roston Chase bowled him for six and Tom Banton lasted just four balls before Russell had him lbw.
Having scored 108 in the first half of their innings, England decelerated with 80 off the back half. Buttler remained their most dangerous asset but fell lbw four short of his ton, Joseph managing a rare success in an otherwise chastening outing.
England trusted Dawson with the new ball as he returned from his long exile and he more than met the challenge. There were just two runs from his first two visits, plus the stumping of Johnson Charles as he misread a slower ball. Shai Hope followed, gifting a wicket to hometown debutant Matthew Potts, but Evin Lewis briefly swaggered with a powerful 39 off 23 balls.
A one-over experiment with Jacob Bethell's part-timers cost 24 runs but also ended the assault as Lewis failed to clear the long leg-side boundary and was well caught by Brydon Carse. That was the cue for Dawson to return and he killed off what remained of the fight in a polished comeback.
Sherfane Rutherford and Chase both sprung the trap at long-on before Rovman Powell was castled by a quicker one that speared into his stumps. Adil Rashid, Bethell and the expensive Potts kept the wickets coming to make it 1-0 ahead of Sunday's clash in Bristol.
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Telegraph
39 minutes ago
- Telegraph
Gabby Logan's daughter Lois: ‘I've never had anything handed to me'
There's an imposter on the gallops at Park House Stables, Kingsclere, the Berkshire racing yard of Andrew Balding. Wearing a bright yellow silk on her riding hat, Lois Logan, the 19-year-old daughter of forthcoming Match of the Day presenter Gabby and her husband, Kenny, is thundering around the track on a race-fit thoroughbred. Yet Lois is a showjumper who only sat on a racehorse for the first time this spring. 'She's been amazing,' Balding's wife, Anna Lisa, tells me as we watch the horses exercise against the backdrop of the sun-scorched north Hampshire Downs. 'To be safe to race involves hard work in the gym and on the horse.' Indeed, to my untrained eye, Lois's riding position is no different from the professionals. 'It's such an adrenalin rush,' she says as she untacks her horse and washes it down. 'These horses are totally different athletes to mine – they're F1 cars not Range Rover Sports. It's the quickest I've gone in my life.' This week, Lois, who is studying geography at Loughborough University, will be riding in the Markel Magnolia Cup – an invitation-only charity race – at the Qatar Goodwood Festival. The event has raised more than £2.7m for good causes since the first race in 2011. She is one of 12 amateur female jockeys who have spent the past few months training at top yards. Park House Stables is where Queen Elizabeth II once kept her racehorses, and is run like a military operation, with 90 staff and 250 horses in training. Gabby warned Lois that it would be tough to fit in training with university, but Lois was determined. 'No time is going to be the right time,' she says. In a relatively short period of time, she has passed a gruelling jockey fitness test, and learnt to ride like a jockey, in a forward leaning crouch above the saddle to minimise wind resistance and maximise control of the horse. 'I've hit the deck once – the horse was going beautifully and from nowhere he slammed on the brakes,' she says. 'I somersaulted over his head and landed on my bum. I was so embarrassed. I just wanted to get back on.' Arguably in contrast to your average teenager, Lois radiates enthusiasm, and can count the number of times she has had a hangover on one hand. 'I've had a couple,' she admits. 'In freshers' week I had one so bad I called my mum and she said, 'You're hungover, welcome to university.'' An early riser, today Lois has been up since 5am, riding a pony she's training to sell – her father came out to help her – before driving 90 minutes to Kingsclere to take two horses around the gallops in the heat. Later this afternoon, she will drive back home to Buckinghamshire to ride her showjumpers and train at the gym. She's kept to a strict diet, with advice from the British Racing School's nutritionists, to ensure she eats enough protein and carbohydrates. Tomorrow she will do it all again. 'I hate waking up past 8am, because it feels like my whole day is gone. I think it comes from my mum and dad,' she says. 'My mum has a day off and spends three hours scrubbing the kitchen floor.' Despite this being her first major interview, Lois, who has appeared on her mother's podcast, The Mid Point – which focuses on midlife challenges and expectations – insists her parents haven't coached her about what to say. 'They trust me to say the right thing,' she says. 'I've seen them in their environments their whole life – I'm not fussed by it.' Gabby's new job presenting Match of the Day has been a proud moment for the family, says Lois, and is totally deserved, as her mother never stops working. 'Sometimes I'll be scrolling Instagram and I'll be like, 'Oh, she's doing that'. She's so busy the whole time.' We are chatting in the 'colour room', a converted barn with walls hung with winning jockey silks. Anna Lisa, who takes all Magnolia Cup entrants under her wing, has left us with a basket of croissants and sausage rolls that she baked this morning. Gabby came here to watch her daughter train a few weeks ago and was so impressed by Park House Stables that she featured them on her other podcast, co-hosted by Mark Chapman, The Sports Agents. 'It blew her brains,' Lois says. 'Even though she isn't horsey, her grandfather was a bookie and she dreamt of being a racehorse trainer when she was younger.' Was Gabby's heart in her throat watching her daughter tear the gallops? 'She's more nervous watching me jump,' Lois says. 'She has to stand at least 10m from my dad because she jumps every jump with me.' The Logans must be one of the sportiest families in Britain. Gabby is the daughter of Welsh former football player and manager Terry Yorath, and before becoming a television presenter she was a rhythmic gymnast, representing Wales in the 1990 Commonwealth Games. Meanwhile Lois's father, Kenny, is a former Scotland international rugby union player who now runs his own sports marketing company. There was never a question that their offspring would play sport – Lois has a twin brother, Reuben, a professional rugby union player for Northampton Saints – although Lois insists that they always did so willingly (with one possible exception during lockdown when Gabby made them exercise for six hours straight to raise money for charity). 'There is this assumption that Mum and Dad are pushy, but they're not,' says Lois. 'They just wanted us to enjoy sport. For them, it's about mental health and release and keeping yourself fit and happy.' She reels off all the sports that she played competitively as a child: swimming, tennis, lacrosse, netball. Oh, and she could have become a professional athlete. 'I had to choose between high jump or showjumping and, weirdly, at university, I've picked up pole vault,' says Lois. Her boyfriend is the South African golfer Cam Raubenheimer; they met at school. The family are all extremely competitive with each other; a game of rounders quickly becomes serious, Lois explains, and there's a healthy amount of mother-daughter rivalry. 'Mum and I ran a half marathon together last year. She took it really seriously and trained very hard, and I didn't,' says Lois. 'We got to the 12th mile and I was like, 'Mum, I didn't train hard enough for this', and she said, 'You're staying with me'. 'Then we got 400m from the finish line and I tried to sprint off and beat her and she was like, 'Don't you dare, because I've got nothing left.' We finished holding hands.' It was Kenny's family who introduced Lois to riding. He grew up with horses on his family's farm in Scotland, and Kenny's mother, a former three-day eventer, was the instigator. At the time, the Logans lived in London, where Lois had to make do with a rocking horse. But at the age of seven, when the family moved to Buckinghamshire, she started having riding lessons. 'It was free childcare for Mum and Dad. They'd drop me at the yard and I'd be there from 9am till 3pm doing chores, scrubbing buckets or filling hay nets, in the hope that I might get a ride if I was lucky,' Lois recalls. 'They'd never drop me off with a lunchbox or water. I'd literally have to fend for myself,' she continues. 'At the start, Mum quite liked the idea of me being horsey. I don't think she knew what I was getting myself into.' Inevitably, Lois's equine passion spiralled. First, she had a loan pony at a local showjumping yard, and then her own pony, Aero. Lois describes Aero as being 'an absolute nut job' who became a winning machine once she got the hang of him. 'I was about eight when I got him and I had no brakes,' she says. 'The first time I jumped him, I fell off and cried. I thought I wasn't going to be allowed to jump him again.' She was a gutsy competitor, with Kenny as her chief groom, driving the horsebox to shows. 'He's learnt along the way with me. He's a proper horseman and amazing with animals,' says Lois. At 16, with a new pony, Oreo Patches, she won two classes at the 2021 British Showjumping National Championships and qualified for the Horse of the Year Show. Now, Lois is moving up the ranks on her horse Jet Stream. 'I'd love to ride in the Olympics, but at this point it seems far off,' she says. Jet Stream is not, however, what horsey people would describe as a 'push button pony' (one that knows exactly what is being asked of it). Lois says she has never been bought a highly trained horse with a proven track record, although people often see her surname and assume otherwise. 'I've never had anything handed to me,' says Lois. 'I'm lucky that my parents have always supported me, but with showjumping, unless you come from a showjumping dynasty – like the Whitaker family – or from obscene wealth, it's really tough. I don't come from either of those backgrounds.' Even if Lois's parents could have afforded to buy her an Olympic horse, she doubts they would have done so. They've given their twins 'an unbelievable set of morals to stand on', she says, and have made them work for everything. Gabby was, she says, the last mother in their year to hand out mobile phones, when they were 13. 'Even when we got them, we were only allowed an hour of screen time a day, on the bus home from school,' she says. 'I think we despised her for a couple of years, but both Reuben and I would do the same,' she adds. 'Social media is such a toxic place for young people.' During Lois's final year at school, when she began to discuss a gap year with her parents, they made it clear that they would not finance her dream of competing in the Sunshine Tour, a five-week annual championship series in Spain. 'I started thinking about fundraising strategies and, in the end, I bought a pony on Facebook. Anything could have turned up on the lorry – a goat! – but luckily he was a lovely pony.' She 'produced' him (equestrian speak for training him to a higher level) and the profit from his sale funded her gap year, paying for her travel to Spain and all the shows. She admits, though, that the luck didn't hold: another pony she bought turned out to have sarcoids (warts), which slashed his value. 'You're never guaranteed to make money with horses,' says Lois. If someone offered her big bucks for her Olympic hopeful, a young horse she has been producing for several years, she says she'd have no choice but to take it. 'With horses, you've got to be prepared to sacrifice certain things to keep the rest of it going,' she says. 'Every time you train [a horse], it costs a certain amount of money. It's like having a child: you've got to think about feed, dentist, vet bills, vaccinations.' She says there is a racy, Jilly Cooper side to showjumping, which she confirms is still alive and kicking. 'There's a bit of naughtiness in all equestrian sports,' she admits. 'Showjumping is so glamorous, with its boots and white jodhpurs and show jackets. There's a big fashion side to it. 'When I was younger I was desperate for a Cavalleria Toscana [a premium range of Italian equestrian clothing] jacket, but my mum wouldn't let me have one,' says Lois. Much to her excitement, the jockey silks she'll be wearing at the Magnolia Cup have been designed by her favourite fashion brand, Rixo. On occasion, Anna Lisa admits she feels nervous for her Magnolia Cup protégées, but not Lois. By Goodwood, she will be truly ready to race. 'She's put in the hours and is beginning to look rather good,' says Anna Lisa. Lois's non-horsey university friends, however, think it's all a bit crazy. She'll have ridden two horses before they've even got out of bed. This summer, she's hoping to take her truck licence, enabling her to drive a large horse lorry, so she won't have to rely on her father. For the time being, though, her focus is on the finishing line at Goodwood. 'I'm the fittest I've ever been,' she says. 'I know there's a risk – the speed is insane – but you can't go about life being scared.'
The Independent
2 hours ago
- The Independent
Broken Ben Stokes steps aside for England prodigy Jacob Bethell to take the stage in India series finale
The news filtered through on Wednesday morning just as bleary eyed journalists were shuffling around The Oval 's perimeter towards an underground press room. Ben Stokes was out. England were heading into the heat of battle in this decisive fifth Test without their warrior captain. In walked Stokes looking like a Viking god, blonde locks slicked back, calves chiselled out of stone, to explain why he could give no more to this absorbing series against India. 'I'm very disappointed. It's a decent tear to one of the muscles that I can't pronounce. We took as long as we could to make the decision.' Stokes' shoulder injury will take six or seven weeks to recover, and he hinted that the looming Ashes series, which begins in Perth in November, was a factor in his decision to step back. 'It was one of those, weighing up the risk and reward, and the risk was way too high if I damaged it further than it is. I wouldn't expect any of my players to play with this kind of injury.' It has been a gruelling few weeks, physically, emotionally, tactically, taking a toll on no one more than Stokes. He has never bowled as many overs in a series, a labour in itself, and he has done it while hitting 304 runs, diving around the field, plotting India's downfall, rallying his players, inciting confrontation and answering a rapt press. His injury felt like an inevitable consequence of all those demands, slain not by India but by Test cricket itself. Not even Stokes is built to play at this intensity, with so little rest over what has been a blisteringly hot English summer. Could he have given himself a lighter workload with the ball? 'No, not at all. When I'm out on the field I play to win and give everything I possibly can. If I feel there's a moment in a game where I need to put everything I'm feeling aside, I'll do that because it's how much this team means to me, how much playing for England means to me, how much winning means to me.' Could the five-Test schedule, packed into six weeks, have been easier on the players? 'The gaps between games could be done a little better. You've had two eight- and nine-day turnarounds and two three-day [turnarounds]. Maybe you could look at making them all five days before every game so there's consistency. It has been tough for both teams.' Indeed, India will be without their own talisman, Jasprit Bumrah, at The Oval, who is still making his way back to full fitness after a back injury. Ollie Pope assumes the captaincy while Jacob Bethell takes Stokes' place at No 6 in the batting line-up. In the supremely talented Bethell, England have a piece of gold that they are still figuring out how best to use. Will he ultimately become a white-ball monster? Is he destined to be a middle-order red-ball destroyer? Could he even become a Test opener, able to fend off the world's best fast bowlers under cloudy skies at 11am? He has the natural ability to do all three. ]Warwickshire teammate Olly Hannon- Dalby told the Guardian a story of visiting Bethell's home as a teenager growing up in Barbados. 'Outside, they have a cricket ball in a sock hanging from a really high beam on a three- or four-metre rope, so a huge arc when it swings. Our guys could hit it three or four times before messing it up, but he kept going and going. He just never missed. 'Not only that, his dad kept shouting random fielding positions and Jacob was middling it to wherever he was told, even though the ball kept swinging back from different angles. It was so, so difficult and pretty crazy to watch.' Aged 21, Bethell was thrown into the deep end of Test cricket on last year's tour of New Zealand, batting at No 3 with almost no red-ball hinterland to call upon. It was not without controversy – he had been fast-tracked, skipping the hard yards on the County Championship circuit without ever recording a ton on a chilly April day at Chester-le-Street like many before him. Yet Bethell responded with a maturity beyond his years, averaging 52 across three matches and playing every kind of shot en route. He has adapted that effortless technique to all forms of cricket, but there remains a glaring omission from his young CV. The 50s column is brimming but the 100s is still empty. His top score in T20s is 87; in ODIs it's 82; in first-class cricket it's 96. He scored 96 against New Zealand but this is a fresh chance to channel all that talent into a first career century. Stokes is not worried about the expectation on Bethell's young shoulders. 'There was a lot more hype and pressure in New Zealand when he was given a chance at No 3 and he handled that pretty well. He gets to slide in at No 6. I'm very confident in his abilities, he's a quality player.' That elusive century won't be easy to come by on a pitch that is expected to be green and offer some assistance to the quick bowlers, which is why England have dropped spinner Dawson and picked four seamers, with Gus Atkinson, Jamie Overton and Josh Tongue coming into a refreshed attack. This is unlikely to be the runs-fest of Old Trafford, and a result should come one way or another. England lead the series 2-1, and a contest coloured by animosity between the two camps can still be drawn by India, something which captain Shubman Gill claimed would be a victory on hostile soil. From accusations of English time-wasting at Lord's, to handshake-gate at Old Trafford and Tuesday's squabble between India coach Gautam Gambhir and The Oval's head groundsman, it has been a spiky encounter. And neither captain would change a thing. 'No regrets,' said Stoke, while Gill insisted: 'The relationship [between the two teams] is fantastic. But in the heat of battle you do or say things you might not do.' The battle has one final instalment at The Oval. Only this time, England must find a way without their all-action hero taking the fight to India. England team for fifth Test v India 1. Zak Crawley 2. Ben Duckett 3. Ollie Pope (c) 4. Joe Root 5. Harry Brook 6. Jacob Bethell 7. Jamie Smith (wk) 8. Chris Woakes 9. Gus Atkinson 10. Jamie Overton 11. Josh Tongue
South Wales Guardian
3 hours ago
- South Wales Guardian
England captain Ben Stokes confident of Ashes fitness despite shoulder injury
Stokes was seen clutching his right shoulder during the fourth innings of last week's draw at Old Trafford but still sent down 11 overs in clear discomfort. He was initially hopeful about lining up in Thursday's fifth Test at the Kia Oval, but scans revealed a grade three tear – the most severe category – meaning he now faces six to 10 weeks of rehabilitation. The road back starts here 👊 — England Cricket (@englandcricket) July 30, 2025 And while he will play nothing more than a cheerleading role in the final match a series where he has emerged as the key performer, the medical advice suggests he is confident of being back in time for what has been billed as a legacy-defining trip to Australia. The Ashes begins in Perth on November 21, with England flying out a fortnight earlier, and he was quick to assure fans he intended to be there. Stokes opted to take the captain's pre-match press conference in place of deputy Ollie Pope, who will lead the team on home turf with the side 2-1 ahead, and was asked directly if he expected to be ready. 'Yeah. It's six or seven weeks probably,' he said, taking an optimistic view of the prognosis. 'I'll start rehabbing now and obviously focus on what we've got coming up in the winter. It's a decent tear of one of the muscles I can't pronounce. I woke up the morning after the game and it was pretty sore so I wasn't surprised that the scan showed something. 'There was obviously a bit of emotion going in when you find out what you've done. I think you need time chatting with the medical team, Baz (head coach Brendon McCullum), and then it was just 20 minutes to myself out there in the morning, just to really be clear around the decision that we made. 'It is one of those where you're weighing up the risk-reward and the risk was way too high for damaging this any further than it currently is. I wouldn't expect to put any one of my players at risk with an injury like this. The series has taken a big toll.' Stokes knows the ropes better than most when it comes to arduous recovery periods. The 34-year-old underwent surgery on a longstanding knee issue in late 2023 and suffered two serious hamstring tears last year. He bounced back better than ever this summer, racking up 140 overs with the ball and facing almost 600 deliveries, but may have ultimately pushed himself beyond his body's capacity. Yet he has no regrets about taking such a punishing workload. 'Not at all. When I'm out on the field I play to win and give everything I possibly can,' he said. 'If I feel there's a moment in a game where I need to put everything I'm feeling aside, I'll do that because that's how much this team means to me, how much playing for England means to me, how much winning means to me. 'Being a professional sportsman, injuries are part of this game and I can't do anything about that.' Stokes' absence means a first Test appearance of the year for rising star Jacob Bethell, who turned heads in New Zealand in December but has been restricted to 12th man duties since. Ben Stokes will miss out on the final Test of the series with a right shoulder injury ❌ And we've made four changes to our side 👇 — England Cricket (@englandcricket) July 30, 2025 That is one of four changes to the England XI, with Liam Dawson standing down one match into his comeback and pace pair Brydon Carse and Jofra Archer rested. In come three fresh quicks, Gus Atkinson and Jamie Overton making their first appearances of the series at their Surrey home and Josh Tongue back after sitting out the last two games. 'We've got a team of 11 match winners. One person doesn't win you a game and just because I am playing or I'm not playing doesn't mean we're going to win or lose,' said Stokes. 'We've have seen people put in some pretty special individual performances and it's another opportunity for another 11 people to hopefully put their hand up and win a game for England.'
