England skipper Ben Stokes refused to sign on the over rate related paperwork after his team was docked two World Test Championship (WTC) points for slow over rate during the third Test against India at Lord’s.

The Three Lions emerged victorious in the match but slow over rate cost them two crucial WTC points, reducing their tally to 22.

On the eve of the fourth Test in Manchester, Stokes asked the International Cricket Council (ICC) to review the existing rules for over rate, considering different conditions around the world.

“I'm not signing the form, no. Over rate isn't something that I worry about, but that's not saying that I purposely slow things down. I do understand the frustration around it, but I honestly think there needs to be a real hard look at how it's structured,” Stokes said in the pre-match presser on Tuesday (July 22).

“You can't have the same rules in Asia where spin is bowling 70 percent of the overs to have the same laws in New Zealand, Australia, England, where it's going to be 70, 80 percent of seam bowled, because the spinner's over takes less time than the seamer's over. Common sense would think that you should look at changing how the over-rates are timed in different continents,” he added.

According to Stokes, there is a need to slow the game down at times and that also impacts the over rate.

“I think also the over rates obviously have gone down over the course of quite a few years now. I wonder if scoring rates have got anything to do with that as well. The ball's getting hit to the boundary more often. It's obviously going to take a lot longer.

“I can understand it from an external point of view around the overs. I really do. But it's a very tough thing to do when I feel there's more to it than just getting round, getting told, 'Oh, just quicken up. Get through your overs.'

“There's a lot that actually goes on out on the field. You've got fast bowlers bending their back consistently. Throughout the course of a game, the time of overs is going to come down. You've just got tired bodies. We played for five days. That was our 15th day of cricket.”

Stokes went on to say that the mid-game injury to a slower bowler also could jeopardise the over rate scenario.

“We, obviously, had an injury to Bash (Shoaib Bashir), a spinner, so we couldn't turn to our spinner as much as we would've liked to on day five, so we had to throw seam at them for pretty much the whole day. That's obviously going to slow things down. There are periods in the game where you do try and just slow everything down, more tactically if anything, like that,” said the England captain.

Stokes highlighted the issue of over rate is extremely simplified at times. “I think there's just so much that influences how your over rates can be affected, that it can't just be as simple as this is the time, this is what you need to do, because you want to keep the quality of cricket as high as you possibly can.

“And there are times in games where there isn't a game on the line where you will just throw the ball to spinner to get your overs round, but then that's just... you're playing in an international game where you're just trying to get your over rate back. I don't think people want to come and watch that,” he remarked.

(With PTI Inputs)