CHRISTCHURCH, New Zealand (AP) — England test captain Ben Stokes said he opted out of the bidding in the Indian Premier League to prioritize playing international cricket in what he described as the “back end” of his career.
Stokes sat out the lucrative IPL this year to ease his workload following knee problems and was a notable absentee in the auction for the 2025 edition.
Stokes, one of cricket's biggest stars, could have commanded a huge fee, given he signed a contract worth $2 million with Chennai Super Kings for last season. His priorities lie elsewhere, though.
“I obviously want to play as long as I possibly can," Stokes told the BBC the day before England begins its test series against New Zealand. "Looking after my body and looking after myself as much as I can is key to that — prioritizing games and when I do play.
"It’s about looking at what I’ve got ahead and making the decision that I think is right for me to be able to prolong my career as long as possible. I want to be wearing this England shirt for as long as I can.”
England is set to hand out a seventh test debut of the year, with Jacob Bethell coming into the team for the first test in Christchurch at No. 3 — a role he has never previously performed in first-class cricket. That's because wicketkeeper Jordan Cox sustained a broken thumb in the nets during a warmup week in Queenstown and was ruled out of the match.
It would have been a test debut for Cox, who was himself only filling in for Jamie Smith, who is on paternity leave.
“It’s a horrible thing to go through an injury and particularly when you’re on the verge of making your test debut,” Stokes said of Cox.
“But as gutted as I am, as gutted as the rest of the team are, you understand that Jordan is even more gutted. You put an arm round him, check in on how he’s going, but there’s not too much you can really say because it is absolutely gutting for the lad and a real shame.”
New Zealand is coming off a historic 3-0 series win in India, while England has just lost a series 2-1 in Pakistan.
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England cricket captain Ben Stokes reacts during the Mihi Whakatau, a traditional teams welcome, on the field at Hagley Oval, ahead of the first cricket test against New Zealand in Christchurch, New Zealand, Tuesday, Nov. 26, 2024. (Andrew Cornaga/Photosport via AP)
England cricket captain Ben Stokes performs a hongi at the Mihi Whakatau, a traditional teams welcome, on the field at Hagley Oval, ahead of the first cricket test against New Zealand in Christchurch, New Zealand, Tuesday, Nov. 26, 2024. (Andrew Cornaga/Photosport via AP)
MANILA, Philippines (AP) — Philippine police officials on Wednesday filed criminal complaints against Vice President Sara Duterte and her security staff for allegedly assaulting authorities and disobeying orders in a recent altercation in Congress.
The criminal complaints filed by the Quezon City police were separate from any legal action that may arise after she publicly threatened to have President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., his wife and the speaker of the House of Representatives assassinated if she were killed herself in an unspecified plot. She has not provided details of that plot.
A presidential adviser, Larry Gadon, separately filed a Supreme Court petition on Wednesday to disbar the vice president as a lawyer, citing her assassination threats, which he said were “illegal, immoral and condemnable.”
The Marcos administration’s legal offensive against Duterte, her father and their allies is a critical juncture in a conflict that has seethed over the last two years between the two most powerful families in the Philippines.
Speaking in a news conference, the vice president broadly denied and played down the criminal complaints, allegations and potential lawsuits against her, including a possible impeachment case and an alleged violation of the country's anti-terror law. She said the government actions were aimed at removing her from office, freezing her properties and bank accounts and barring her from traveling abroad.
Duterte said without elaborating that the danger to her life was real but added that the threats she made were not actual and illegal.
“This is really oppression and harassment for remarks taken out of logical context,” Duterte said. She also said in response to a question that she no longer thought a reconciliation with the president was possible.
“I really believe that we have reached a point of no return,” she said.
The Department of Justice said it is also looking into potentially seditious remarks by Marcos’s predecessor and the vice president’s father, Rodrigo Duterte, who said in a news conference that the civilian government would only listen if the military voices concerns about corruption and irregularities under the Marcos administration.
"There is a fractured governance. … It is only the military that can correct it,” the former president said Monday night. He said he was not urging the military to rise up against Marcos but only reaffirming the real situation in the Philippines.
Still, justice officials said an investigation into the former president's remarks will proceed.
The criminal complaints for assaulting, disobeying and grave coercion against police authorities were filed against the vice president and her security staff and other aides before state prosecutors, a police statement said. Such crimes are punishable by a jail term and a fine.
The complaints were set off by a chaotic squabble over the weekend in the House of Representatives, where the vice president’s chief of staff, Zuleika Lopez, has been temporarily detained. Legislators accused Lopez of obstructing and not cooperating with a congressional inquiry into alleged misuse of confidential and intelligence funds by the offices of the vice president and the education secretary, which Sara Duterte held.
At one point, authorities were ordered to transfer Lopez to a women’s prison outside Congress, causing her to become agitated. The vice president and her staff intervened to oppose the order and Lopez was eventually moved to a government hospital, where she remains confined.
“The rule of law is fundamental to our democratic system. No one, regardless of their position, should be above accountability,” national police chief Gen. Rommel Francisco Marbil said of the criminal complaints against the vice president and her aides. The national police “remain committed to ensuring the proper execution of lawful orders and protecting public order,” he said.
"Resistance and disobedience to a person in authority not only violates the law but also undermines public trust,” Marbil said.
In a separate case, authorities delivered a subpoena to the vice president's office Tuesday, inviting her to answer investigators’ questions about the threats she made over the weekend. Duterte had said she was not making a direct threat but was expressing concerns for her own safety.
Marcos said in a televised public address that the vice president’s threats against him, his wife Liza Marcos and House Speaker Martin Romualdez were a criminal plot and vowed to fight them and uphold the rule of law.
Marcos ran with Sara Duterte as his vice-presidential running mate in the 2022 elections and both won landslide victories on a campaign call for national unity. In the Philippines, the president and vice president are elected separately, and that has resulted in rival politicians assuming the top political posts in a country with deep political and social divisions.
The two leaders and their camps have since fallen out over key differences, including their approaches to China’s aggressive territorial claims i n the disputed South China Sea and views on ex-President Duterte’s anti-drug crackdown, which left thousands of mostly poor suspects dead.
Sara Duterte resigned from the Marcos Cabinet in June as education secretary and head of an anti-insurgency body and became one of the most vocal critics of the president, his wife and Romualdez, the president’s cousin who heads a congress that’s dominated by their allies.
Philippine Vice President Sara Duterte gestures as she attends a hearing at the House of Representative in Quezon City, Philippines on Monday Nov. 25, 2024. (AP Photo/Aaron Favila)
FILE - Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. listens during the 12th Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) -U.S. Summit in Vientiane, Laos, Oct. 11, 2024. (AP Photo/Sakchai Lalit, File)
FILE - Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., center right, and Vice President Sara Duterte, daughter of former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte, raise hands during the inauguration ceremony at National Museum on Thursday, June 30, 2022 in Manila, Philippines. (AP Photo/Aaron Favila, File)
This combination photo shows Philippine Vice President Sara Duterte, left, in Quezon City, Philippines, Nov. 13, 2024, and Philippines President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. in Vientiane, Laos, Oct. 9, 2024. (AP Photo)
