England have their "fingers crossed" for Ben Stokes after the all-rounder suffered an injury against India, so says Ollie Pope.
Stokes suffered an apparent groin issue on his way to finishing the day on 39 not out, with England reaching stumps on 251-4.
The England captain had to be treated on the field at Lord's but soldiered on.
However, he did turn down a run in the final over, which would have seen Joe Root reach his century. Instead, the former skipper will start Friday's play on 99.
"Fingers crossed he can do something magic and come back strong," said Pope, who is vice-captain.
"Clearly we've got a big Test over the next four days and a big two coming up. It's important to try to manage him, and we'll see how he pulls up tomorrow.
"For me, it's partially one of my roles to make sure he doesn't push himself to a ridiculous place with whatever he's dealing with at the moment.
"I'm sure the physios and medics will work with him to lay out a plan and I'll help push him in the right direction."
Pope scored 44 as he put on a third-wicket partnership of 109 with Root, having been dropped on the first ball he faced.
Root and Pope have now recorded seven partnerships of 100+ runs in Tests. Since the latter made his England debut in 2018, only two duos have logged more such stands in the longest format – Marnus Labuschagne and Steve Smith (nine), and Jonny Bairstow and Root (eight).
England, though, did score at their slowest rate while putting on over 200 since Stokes took over as captain and Brendon McCullum joined as coach in 2022.
"It's not necessarily the way we're used to going about a first innings, but I think 251-4 is a pretty good score at the minute," Pope explained, as quoted by BBC Sport.
"Obviously we would have liked some more runs, but the nature of the surface and the way the Indian attack bowled was pretty good.
"It's a day we'll take. We had to adapt the way we play, but hopefully it's a score we can really kick on from tomorrow and make it north of 400, towards 500."
