Over the course of the World Cup and The Ashes, we witnessed one of cricket’s great redemption stories. Ben Stokes went from punching lockers and people to punching the air in celebration as he led England to victory much to the delight of millions. He exorcised his demons and became a new hero for many, while longer-term fans forgave his previous transgressions as he came of age in the most spectacular of circumstances. One of the beauties of cricket is that within a team environment there is still scope for individual stories. With the new central contracts – notably the omission of Liam Plunkett – pointing towards the future, perhaps now is the right time to forgive another man for his misdemeanors. With Ashley Giles recently declaring that the door to international cricket is not closed for him, maybe it’s time to forgive Alex Hales.

“The door isn’t closed. He’s a very fine short-format player,” Giles said.

“In the immediate term, he hasn’t played a lot of cricket this year for us for different reasons and, as [captain] Eoin Morgan has said, there’s a certain amount of trust that needs to be gained back.

“He needs to keep working hard and getting the runs – but if he does that, who knows?”

Hales striking 116 against Sri Lanka in the 2014 T20 World Cup.

Hales’ omission from the World Cup squad was completely understandable. It was clear that the group of players involved in England’s so-called ‘white-ball revolution’ were a close unit, and in the aftermath of the Hales incident, it was evident that a violation of team culture and trust was a key reason for his removal from the squad. However, Hales has now served his time. It is difficult to remember in the euphoria of victory that Hales was a critical component in the transformation of England’s white-ball fortunes. Arguably, he offered us a glimpse into England’s best-ever generation of one day cricketers before they really came to the fore with his memorable unbeaten 116 against Sri Lanka in the 2014 T20 World Cup. He should have been a world cup winner on the 14^th of July, with a medal draped around his neck as part of the side whose identity he helped to forge. Instead, he watched from the side-lines, with his mistake costing him the opportunity he had spent 4 years working towards. He will never get the chance to play in or win a World Cup on home soil again. That in itself is a just punishment.

A phenomenal white ball talent

Beyond the fact that he has been adequately punished, the other compelling argument for Hales’ return to the England set up is that their depth at the top of the order is perhaps not quite as deep as imagined. The absence of Jason Roy had a monumental impact on England during the World Cup, and the inability of James Vince to fill that void was evident in the group games against Sri Lanka and Australia. Admittedly, that was in part due to Jason Roy’s status as one of the best white-ball openers in the world and therefore a difficult man to replace but beyond Roy, Jonny Bairstow and Hales, the options at the top of the order are not obvious. Sam Billings and Moeen Ali failed to solidify themselves as suitable candidates to take up the opening mantle, and while there are exciting young players like Tom Banton coming through, Hales offers a level of skill and experience that is unrivaled. He remains a phenomenal white ball talent. He was one of only two players to pass fifty at finals day on a pitch that was offering plenty of assistance, particularly slow bowlers. It was a timely reminder of his talents with the T20 World Cup round the corner and with questions over Eoin Morgan’s fitness and Joe Root suitability to the shortest format, now is the perfect time to welcome Hales back into the England set-up.

Time for a second chance

Ultimately, like us all, Hales is human and humans make mistakes. But as Ben Stokes showed, it is possible to make mistakes and come back better. As an England fan, I want to watch Hales in an England shirt again. He is a cricketer of genuine quality and has the potential to light up the international stage on the biggest  of occasions. Let us hope he gets a second chance to do so.

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Firstly, let’s turn our attention to his playing career. 134 tests, 404 ODIs, over 28,000 international runs and 63 international centuries. He sits at number six on the all-time leading test run-scorers with only Alistair Cook, Rahul Dravid, Jacques Kallis, Ricky Ponting and Sachin Tendulkar ahead of him. All of them have played more games and none average more than Sangakkara. These numbers alone propel him into the conversation of ‘greatest of all-time’. He retained relevance as the importance of One Day cricket and T20 cricket increased. He played in two World Cup finals and three World T20 finals, passing 50 in three of those games; most memorably in 2014 where he led his side to their first global triumph since 1996 with a Man of the Match performance.  He was as much a white ball titan as he was a traditional red ball great. Additionally, he was not merely a great batter with his wicket-keeping ability often overshadowed by his batting mastery. 678 international dismissals place him up with the best of glovemen, and none of them have claimed as many as Sangakkara’s 482 in ODI cricket. It is therefore indisputable on statistics alone that Sangakkara is in the conversation for the greatest player to ever play the game.

It would be wrong however to assess greatness on numbers alone. Cricket is a sport which stimulates many emotions from pain to pleasure, to frustration and anxiety. Sometimes it is how you feel watching that really matters. My dad still purrs to me about Vivian Richards flicking the ball through midwicket or David Gower caressing it through the covers in the same way I marvel at Jos Buttler ramping the ball for six or Ben Stokes reverse-sweeping Nathan Lyon into the grandstand with a mixture of awe and wonder. In a way, Sangakkara’s 147 at Lords in 2014 – the 36^th of his 38 test hundreds – was his career in a microcosm. He scored all around the ground off the front and back foot, on his way to etching his name onto the most famous of honours boards at his last attempt, with all his usual grace and elegance. He got off the mark with a clip through midwicket, scored heavily square of the wicket cutting and pulling anything short and reached the moment he’d long sought by crashing Joe Root to the cover boundary. He celebrated his moment with the dignity fitting of a batter of his class and was embraced by his long-time partner Mahela Jayawardene as Lords (including the English contingent of fans) rose to applaud greatness. As well as being a joy to watch, there is a romantic element in the way Sangakkara continued to play first-class cricket after his international retirement regardless of the fact he had nothing left to prove. One can only presume he played for no other reason than for the love of playing. It’s not like he waned on the pitch either as he lashed 8 centuries for Surrey in his final season, fittingly ending not out in his final first-class innings. Sangakkara was not only a great by numbers. He appealed to the cricketing purist as much as the statistician. He was a man for every type of cricket lover.

Finally, it is important to consider how Kumar Sangakkara has used his status as a cricketing great. For me, it is here where Sangakkara promotes himself from a ‘great’ to the ‘greatest’. How great players conduct themselves as people on and off the pitch does matter. Brian Lara clashed with the West Indies Cricket Board over a sponsorship deal, Steve Smith was wrapped up in a ball-tampering scandal that brought national shame and Virat Kohli constantly antagonises the opposition through verbals. In contrast, the number of people to applaud Kane Williamson in the aftermath of the World Cup final highlighted the importance and the power of the behaviour of leading cricketers. In 2011, Sangakkara was tasked with giving the MCC ‘Spirit of Cricket’ lecture, and he used the platform to speak passionately about his country. He spoke of his upbringing and how cricket united a nation divided by religion, politics and civil war. Throughout, he underlined thoroughly what it meant to be Sri Lankan, how this inspired the cricket team in 1996 and the power cricket has to achieve great things in Sri Lanka. He did not shy away from the harder issues criticising power politics in Sri Lankan cricket, the government and its levels of corruption. In short, he used his status as a national icon and global star to advance the cause of millions of ordinary people. He concluded by saying: ‘I will… play the game hard and fair and be voice with which Sri Lanka can speak proudly and positively to the world’. He spoke with eloquence rivalled only by his batting when he said: ‘I am Tamil, Sinhalese, Muslim and Burgher. I am a Buddhist, a Hindu, a follower of Islam and Christianity. I am today, and always, proudly Sri Lankan.’ It is fitting therefore that a man so aware of both his personal importance and the importance of the sport as a whole has been chosen as the first non-British president of the MCC as he continues to go above and beyond what is expected. He is admired around the world – especially in Asia – and is not tarnished by the rivalry between India and Pakistan. He is an excellent choice to lead the MCC as the game continues to expand into countries all over the world and one would expect that he will lead with the grace, poise and dignity he has shown on and off the field throughout his cricketing career.

Kumar Sangakkara. The greatest of all-time.

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