When Ben Stokes anointed Harry Brook as England’s next Test captain in waiting during his final press conference as an international player at Trent Bridge in June, he did it because he knew the Yorkshireman was ready to step up.

Joe Root got the gig instead, with coach Brendon McCullum sacked amid the mid-summer chaos but remaining as England’s white-ball coach.

The main reason for that is his relationship with Brook, who has flourished as captain of the ODI and T20 sides alongside McCullum since taking over the job in April of last year.

Bazball may be dead, with Root and Stephen Fleming, McCullum’s red-ball replacement, forging a new path for England’s Test team.

Yet it has been given a fresh start within the white-ball set-up as Brook and McCullum build a partnership that looks as tight and formidable as the one between the Kiwi coach and Stokes when they started England’s Test reboot in spectacular fashion back in the summer of 2022.

There’s no doubt the pair are kindred spirits, with Brook saying this week: “We see the game very similarly. He’ll be trying to send messages out and I’m already kind of doing what he’s sending out before the message gets there. The way we’ve worked over the last 18 months has been awesome and we’re only getting stronger.”

Will Jacks, Brook’s deputy for the ongoing one-day series against Sri Lanka, adds: “It is Harry’s first captaincy experience. Brendon took a lead and then Harry has grown into that role in the last 18 months. Now he is really flourishing and the team around him are flourishing too.”

The interesting thing about how England are developing under Brook and McCullum is that it is giving the coach a chance to right the wrongs of the Bazball era in Test cricket.

Playing one-dimensional cricket was the charge and despite talking a good game about adapting to conditions and playing situations more smartly it never happened.

Now, though, the same messaging is being put out there by Brook about the white-ball teams – and it’s actually happening.

“I think that he’s enjoying just doing the white-ball for now,” Brook said of McCullum.

“He said towards the back end of his Test stint he wants to refine a few things here and there and I think he’s brought that into the white-ball squad as well. It’s not all about just going out there all guns blazing trying to hit boundaries left, right and centre. You’ve got to have a little bit of nous and a little bit of skill to rotate strike and bat for longer periods of time and that’s something we’ve spoken about a lot.”

We saw this in action at Durham on Tuesday when England ground out a total of 265 on a low, slow pitch before eventually winning the game by dismissing Sri Lanka for 176.

Notably England went through periods where they were patient enough to grind out tough periods against Sri Lanka’s spinners: from the 30th to 40th over they scored just 39 runs. It was the first ODI since 2019 when they failed to score a single six.

Is this what might have happened if McCullum had been given a chance to partner Brook in the Test set-up too? We’ll never know, but a version of Bazball – a more refined, nuanced one – still exists.

Jacks, who took career-best figures of five for 22 at Durham, underlined the point. “I think it was really obvious when Harry first took over as captain they gelled straight away,” he said of the captain’s relationship with the coach. “They both view white-ball cricket and cricket in general quite similarly. They always look to put pressure on the opposition and we have moulded that into the right way to play, not being reckless but looking to be positive whatever the situation requires.

“The fact they work so well really helps our communication. There are constant messages going back and forth on the field and we never feel we are behind the game in that we are not sure what to do. We are very well prepared and planned for the opposition.”

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The last point is interesting too. Preparation, or a lack of it, was one of the key criticisms of McCullum’s methods during last winter’s doomed Ashes campaign in Australia.

It feels we are watching a coach who has learned from that and is now making positive change – only in a different format.

England have been excellent in T20 cricket since McCullum and Brook partnered up, winning 23 of their past 26 matches. They are improving in one-day cricket, too, and are one win away from a third successive series win this year.

With McCullum’s contract running out after next year’s ODI World Cup in South Africa, Zimbabwe and Namibia, might we see Bazball, a new, more mature version at least, have the last laugh after all?