Worcester today rained sixes as the New England Test skipper made a roaring comeback to the sport. Ben Stokes smashed a County Championship-record of 17 sixes as he scored a stunning 161 off just 88 balls on his first appearance of the season for Durham. He smashed a 64-ball ton smashing a whopping 34 runs in a single over bowled by left-arm spinner Josh Baker. Perhaps Stokes missed out on the historic six sixes in an over by a whisker, as the final ball of the over landed just ahead of the boundary ropes.
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The thrashing happened in the 117th over, when the Durham pair was already thrashing the opposition from both ends. Ben Stokes was already batting on 70 off 59 deliveries when he took on the spin bowler smacking him for five successive sixes. The first ball was a long run maximum, while the second went over the deep mid-wicket fielder. Third and fourth went to the long-off and long-on while the last delivery went down the ground only for the ball to fall short of the boundary and go for four. Meanwhile hitting the fifth six he reached his century in just 64 balls.
Stokes- the new King of sixes
However, Stokes wasn’t content still smashing a few more strokes he reached 150* in just 82 balls, hitting 8 fours and 16 sixes. Hitting 16 sixes he surpassed the previous record-high of 16 sixes jointly held by Andrew Symonds and Graham Napier. Stokes hit the most sixes in any first-class innings of fewer than 200 runs, while it was the second time he has struck five successive sixes in the County Championship having also achieved the feat at Hampshire in 2011.
Most sixes in a County Championship innings
| Number of sixes | Player |
| 17 | Ben Stokes |
| 16 | Andrew Symonds |
| 16 | Graham Napier |
“At the end of the day, you are judged on winning games. That has always been the most important thing for me. Decisions I make are based on what is the best thing to do to give us a chance. I want to have 10 other guys out there with me who have that mindset.”
Stokes said in an interview
As far as the match is concerned, Durham has already posted 549 runs for the loss of four wickets in 123 overs with Sean Dickson (104) and David Bedingham (135) being the other centurions in the innings.
