England under Stokes have shown everyone that cricket is meant to be enjoyment.

Nobody talks about the last ball of the Ashes. That initial ball that's famous. That wide that goes to the slips, that cover drive for four, that wicket, clean bowled! Last balls? I had to research them. Ali cutting a stroke behind to finish an innings defeat in a dead rubber in 2015; Boyd Rankin being taken at slip off Ryan Harris, Rankin participating in his sole Test at the fag-end of a rapid downfall in a 5-0 whitewash that's been plentiful in 2014; a Harmison short ball ricocheting away Langer's shoulder for extras, the sole boundary the Australian team score in a run chase they'll not undertake in 2005.

It separates between questioning how things will go, and knowing how they do. One undeniable fact, there's no guarantee there will be a happy ending. For the previous decade, the English visits to Australia have concluded in failure, instead of with them. Flower was removed as coach after a crushing loss, in 2013-14, Chris Silverwood was sacked after a further defeat, in 2021-22. It's possible to form a couple of teams out of national team members who featured in their final Test match at the conclusion of an tour to Australia during the past 25 years, and even have a couple of men over to serve as reserves for both teams.

The current English side have not asserted to be overly concerned about consequences. Stokes, like Morgan with the one-day side before him, frequently remarks that regardless of whether a aerial shot is caught on the boundary is secondary as whether it was the right decision to attempt it in the outset, and during play he's pleased to applaud a bowler who concedes runs so long as they bringing the team toward taking that next wicket. But then the primary motive Ben Stokes tried to guide his players to follow this style was so they would be in a superior situation to deliver the kind of cricket he feels will succeed for them in Australia.

This Ashes series, for which they have been planning extensively, already appears as the result they cannot escape. It is this bold strategy's decisive moment. And there are too many “I told you so’s” in English cricket for the team to get away with it if they do experience another poor loss in the coming weeks. Stokes's approach has been founded on defying expectations, and the other side is it feels as if there are plenty of people who would be thrilled to be validated.

In light of this, it's a appropriate time to highlight that the key issue is not only where this ultimately leads, but if we found pleasure along the way. In the recent past, the English team were an utterly abject national side. They had been beaten in four consecutive series and were trailing in the final one, against India, when it was halted because of Covid. They had won only one Test match out of a series of 17, and lost a dozen of them by humiliating deficits. An eight-wicket defeat to the Black Caps at Edgbaston, 157 runs to the Indian squad at the the famous stadium, an an innings defeat to the Australians at Melbourne, A ten-wicket loss to the Windies in the scenic location.

The team was soundly beaten by the Caribbean team in Grenada in the early part of 2022 just before Joe Root resigned as skipper.

By the conclusion, after all those months of health protocols and isolation and biosecure bubbles and repeated losses at the hands of all opponents, they were practically the most miserable and exhausted Test team the English cricket board had ever sent out to a sports ground. A great deal of what Stokes and McCullum have done in the subsequent years was in reaction to all that, as well as the former's personal encounters during his hiatus from the game in 2021 when he had suffered a bout of anxiety. It was intended to remind everyone that it was supposed to be enjoyable, if it was supposed to be anything at all.

This continues to be the case now. Although the the prestigious contest is on the line, and although the team have finally recognized that they need to be a little more flexible in the way they approach playing the game. Normal existence has a way of imposing, it can be hard to remember the knowledge we acquire in our lowest moments.

This is the England team that peeled off back-to-back run chases of 277, 299, and 296 in one season against New Zealand; that achieved a massive 378 to defeat the Indian team that same summer; that became the initial visiting side to win a comprehensive victory in Pakistan; that showed resilience to a tie after going trailing by two matches in the Ashes; that overcame the Indian team in Hyderabad off the back of one of the most remarkable knocks ever played in the the region, and then beat Pakistan in the location off the back of a further exceptional performance.

Here we have the national side, too, that somehow end up suffering a defeat in a Test by an large margin even though the opposition made only 326; who fetched up suffering a loss in one of the finer contests ever staged after making a bold declaration in the initial batting effort against the Kiwis, and then followed suit against Australia; who were routed by a huge margin in the Indian city, and who were on the wrong end of one of the Sri Lankan team's finest wins. Collectively, they have secured some of the most improbable victories, endured some of the most embarrassing exits, achieved some of the surprising tons, and taken some of the most surprising five-wicket hauls in the records of the national sport.

However this prestigious tournament concludes, they have been, one after another, astonishing, outrageous, ridiculous, infuriating, and entirely, unrepentantly, boldly enjoyable.