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Never said India lost deliberately: Ben Stokes dismisses ‘clickbait’ rumours

Media reports started surfacing that Stokes had made claims in his book that Indian batsmen showed no intent while chasing England’s mammoth total of 337.

Never said India lost deliberately: Ben Stokes dismisses ‘clickbait’ rumours

Ben Stokes file image. (Photo by Dibyangshu Sarkar / AFP)

All-rounder Ben Stokes quashed all the claims which said that he had written in his to-be-published book that India lost the 2019 World Cup match against England deliberately.

Earlier this week, media reports started surfacing that Stokes had made claims in his book that Indian batsmen Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli and Mahendra Singh Dhoni showed no intent while chasing England’s mammoth total of 337.

“Arguably, the way MS Dhoni played when he came in with 112 runs needed from 11 overs was even stranger. He appeared more intent on singles than sixes. Even with a dozen balls remaining, India could still have won. There was little or no intent from him (Dhoni) or his partner Kedar Jadhav. To me, while victory is still possible you always go for broke,” Stokes has reportedly written in his soon-to-be-published book.

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“Arguably, the way MS Dhoni played when he came in with 112 runs needed from 11 overs was even stranger. He appeared more intent on singles than sixes. Even with a dozen balls remaining, India could still have won. There was little or no intent from him (Dhoni) or his partner Kedar Jadhav. To me, while victory is still possible you always go for broke,” he has added.

Going by this, former Pakistan bowler Sikander Bakht wrote on Twitter that the English all-rounder had said in his book that India lost deliberately to England to remove Pakistan from the World Cup.

“Ben Stokes writes in his book that India lost to England deliberately to remove Pakistan from world Cup 19 and we predicted it,” Bakht tweeted.

In response to Bakht’s tweet, a Twitter user asked where has Stokes made such comments. In response to the user’s question, the star England all-rounder himself responded: “You won’t find it cause I have never said it… it’s called “twisting of words” or “click bait”.”

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