Writing in the 2020 edition, Wisden Almanack editor Lawrence Booth places Ben Stokes’ Headingley epic inside England’s three greatest Test innings.

With the Ashes on the line, Stokes made 135 not out, adding 76 for the last wicket with Jack Leach to help England to a national-record chase, completing a remarkable turnaround after they had been bowled out for 67 in the first innings.

The other two innings that “can challenge Stokes”, with the caveat that only those “reported on widely enough” were considered, are Kevin Pietersen’s Ashes-sealing 158 at The Oval in 2005 and Ian Botham’s 118 off 102 balls at Old Trafford in the 1981 Ashes. “The argument may one day be settled by another innings, and Stokes will doubtless play it,” wrote Booth.

However, he ranks the drama of Headingley “only the second-most astonishing twist of 2019”, behind England’s World Cup final super over win and while willing to rank England’s greatest Test innings – Graham Gooch’s 154* against West Indies at Headingley in 1991, Botham’s 149 against Australia at Headingley in 1981, and Pietersen’s 186 against India at Mumbai in 2012 are mentioned outside of the aforementioned top three – Booth declared it “arbitrary to proclaim [Stokes’ innings] the greatest of all time”.