The defending champions England’s head coach Matthew Mott wants Ben Stokes and Jorfa Archer in the squad for the ICC Cricket World Cup 2023 which will be held in India.
Stokes, 32, announced his ODI retirement in July 2022 to manage his workload and focus mainly on red-ball cricket.
However, with World Cup approaching and Stokes being one of the most important pillars of this English team, everyone wants to see the hero of the 2019 World Cup final — who scored an unbeaten 84 againts New Zealand — in the squad.
"Jos will probably lead the way on that communication, but Ben’s pretty straight with all of us," Matthew Mott said. "We will see if he’s keen.
"There has not been a clear direction on what he’s going to do yet, but we are still hopeful. I’ve always said his bowling would be a bonus, but just look at what he brings with the bat, even in the field.”
Mott also talked about how important Stokes’ presence is as everyone saw in the Ashes 2023 where England came back from 2-0 and drew the series 2-2.
"Watching him throughout the whole Ashes series, he had such a great presence. He’s done it for years when it comes to performing in one-day cricket and so he’s an invaluable commodity.”
England are also hopeful for their other hero, Jorfa Archer, who bowled England’s super over in the 2019 World Cup final and led his team to victory.
Mott talked about his team’s plan to gamble on the pacer’s fitness for the mega event.
"There is a high chance that we will take risk on a proven performer [like Archer] that has done it on the world stage," Mott said.
"We are planning for him to be available. Obviously, a lot of things have to go his way and it will be a tight timeline but with players like that you are going to give them every opportunity to prove their fitness, and so we will keep an open mind.’
"It would be a big ask for him to play every game, so we would have to target specific ones, but we are big on ball speed for India, we feel like that’s a really important asset for us to have out there and it will be good to see Mark Wood, who had such an impact in the Ashes, do the same with the white ball."
England will kick off their World Cup 2023 campaign on October 5, facing the runner-ups of the World Cup 2019 New Zealand at the Narendra Modi Stadium, Ahmedabad