Enjoy Ben Stokes and England while you can – the end may not be far away

England have turned down offers of a fly on the wall Ashes Bazball documentary this summer and instead will let the cricket do their talking when the Test summer starts today at Lord’s.

Brendon McCullum and Ben Stokes rejected the project, which had the backing of some senior figures at the England and Wales Cricket Board, because they did not want cameras intruding on the dressing room and potentially spoiling the dynamic they have carefully built over the past 12 months.

McCullum has slimmed down the backroom staff so it is no surprise that the last thing he wants is more people in the dressing room, especially from outside the group and alien to the environment he has crafted since taking over.

It will help retain the mystique around their formula for revitalising Test cricket and ensures the players focus on the cricket, not the cameras. Australia will again be followed by documentary makers this summer and have already been the subject of two series of The Test, an Amazon Prime documentary, which provided one of the images of the 2019 summer when Justin Langer, their then head coach, kicked a dustbin across the changing room as Stokes hit the winning runs at Headingley.

With Stokes and McCullum saying no to something similar, it is best to just enjoy what is happening right in front of your eyes over the next six weeks instead, partly because there is a chance it may not last that much longer.

In his first press conference of the summer Stokes spoke of the “journey” his team are on but with so many questions about his knee and his future as a Test all-rounder, who knows what the future holds for him. He answered every question, and there were a lot of them, about his knee without actually giving anything away. He has still not disclosed the exact nature of the problem.

Stokes is 31 but the body aged far beyond those years, Jonny Bairstow is 33, Stuart Broad 36 and then, of course, there is 40-year-old James Anderson, not playing this week but looking good in the nets for the first Ashes Test (and Mark Wood, too). The break up of this side is probably not far away, down to natural regeneration, hence Josh Tongue making a debut instead of 34-year-old Chris Woakes coming back.

The other reason to stay in the moment is because this Test summer starts on June 1 and will be all over by July 31, a whirlwind few weeks of six Tests that will provide many twists and turns, making the interest from documentary makers understandable.

Rob Key said “buckle up and get ready for the ride” when he appointed McCullum and Stokes and that rings true this week when they will be looking for a quick kill against Ireland so they can fully focus on Australia.

“This Ashes series is just part of the journey that we’ve been on and will continue to be on after this series. If you look at it too deeply as the be-all and end-all, when the Ashes series is finished, win or lose, it’ll be like, ‘What do we do from here?’” Stokes said.

“This summer is part of something long and this is just another thing we’ve got on our journey that we’ve had. The best thing about this team is that we don’t know the destination.”

Ireland are poorly prepared: they have not staged any domestic first-class cricket since the pandemic and lost all six Tests they have played. They even described this match as ‘not the pinnacle’ as they target World Cup qualification instead, which is understandable given the money it could unlock.

There are county teams that would probably provide better opposition this week and this could be one of the great mismatches of all time. Then again, taking Ireland lightly has burned England before.

England’s preparation for the summer not been ideal

In the past England teams would have seen this week as a chance for some decent time in the middle, bat twice regardless of the match situation and put overs in the legs.

That is not their style anymore and if they get ahead early this could be a quick one-sided game and not a freakish one like the match between these sides in 2019 that lasted just seven sessions.

England have not had the smoothest starts to the summer. There have been injuries to the bowlers, Joe Root has not played a serious game of cricket since February, Harry Brook was dropped at the Indian Premier League as he suffered his first dip in form since breaking on the scene and Zak Crawley remains as inconsistent as ever.

Neither captain nor coach can understand why there would be any pessimism after winning 10 out of 12 Tests so handsomely.

“I think I sort of find myself answering the same question really about ‘is this going to continue?’ But I think it’s pretty clear that we have found a way in which we’ve been able to get the best out of ourselves as individuals and as a team,” Stokes said.

“That’s how we always want to play because we’ve seen success in it. It’s not always going to work, you know, because you win games and you lose games, but what we have been able to do is find a formula that really works for the individuals that we have. That won’t change because of the opposition.”