Bar one idiot asking what time his kebab shop opens, Moeen Ali has been surprised at how quiet the Australian crowds have been. Instead, his lingering annoyance after defeats in the first two Tests has been a sense of having let England and Joe Root down.
Moeen, who on Saturday captains an otherwise green England team of reserves and Lions players in a two-day tour match against a Cricket Australia XI but may only fleetingly bowl to allow his cut spinning finger some respite, came to the country expecting abuse on and off the field given all the pre-series buildup. The most notable sledge he has received from one of Steve Smith’s side so far came in Brisbane when he was pointedly told upon his arrival at the crease that, at No6, he was batting a spot too high. His typically deadpan retort? “I said I was actually two spots too high,” said Moeen, recounting the story at the team hotel on Friday. “It went straight over his head.”
Though noting that Ashes cricket in Australia has indeed been a step up in intensity from his previous 44 Test appearances, the 30-year-old claimed to have been unfazed. And while the stands have produced “some good ones and some not so good ones” in terms of wise cracks, for all the buzz “it has been pretty quiet to be honest”.
“Somebody asked me what time my kebab shop opened but that is about it. You get a bit but nothing major,” said the all-rounder, shrugging off such nonsense in his usual laid-back manner during what has otherwise been a tough start to his first Test tour to Australia.
The photograph of Moeen, arms aloft and surrounded by joyous team-mates after his hat-trick at The Oval, was one of the major images of an English summer when he claimed 30 wickets against South Africa and West Indies. This winter, hampered by a lack of rhythm from an early side strain and a cut on his spinning finger that has refused to heal, the returns have not been so good.
Two victims at 98 runs apiece – while his rival spinner Nathan Lyon has been tormenting the English batsmen and allowing Australia’s three quicks to rotate – has affected Root’s options in the field. This has not been the bowler of July and August, rather an imitation that has lacked his usual snap in delivery and bite off the pitch.
Moeen said: “You feel like you’ve let the team down and the captain down especially. I’ve done that in the past when Alastair Cook was captain. It’s not always easy. Lyon is bowling so well with the revs and areas he’s hitting. The hardest thing is you compare yourself to that and then you try even harder. He has a lot more bowling under his belt as an international.
“It just shows where I’m at as a cricketer and a spinner in the team. I got picked as a second spinner and ended up becoming No1. Coming over here I’ve not bowled as well. I just feel there is a lot of work to be done and hopefully it gets better as the series goes on. It needs to.
“I knew that in the summer there will be a time or a series where you don’t bowl as well or bat as well so you don’t want to get too carried away. I didn’t want to say I was a top-class spinner because I knew how tough it was going to be in Australia. Even with the batting I never get too overconfident or too down about things, I just kind of go with the flow.”
Moeen’s finger issue was caused by the hard seam on the Kookaburra ripping the skin during the Gabba Test and though plenty of advice has been offered to him regarding how best to cure it – from olive oil to dipping it in urine – he has instead let nature take its course. “I don’t want to make any excuses,” he said. “It’s fine now. It has to have played a part [in my performance], especially in the first game. I couldn’t feel the ball on my fingers and it was very sore. This game in Adelaide – my finger was fine. I just didn’t bowl well.”
Batting-wise, it is testament to Moeen’s standing in the team that Root said before Adelaide he would play as a specialist if needs be, having pushed the left-hander up to No6, rather than Jonny Bairstow, in the absence of the suspended Ben Stokes.
Moeen’s scores have been in keeping with the team at large. Three starts of 38, 40 and 25 not capitalised on, with Lyon his conqueror in all four of his innings. That is why, while his team-mates are taking a break from the action, Moeen is keen for time in the middle on the bouncy Western Australian pitches, having missed the warmup match here when his side injury flared up.
On the prospect of Thursday’s third Test at the Waca and beyond, he added: “We’ve got three games to put it right. Two-nil down isn’t great but we’ve still got a chance. We’ve shown enough fight in this team that we can compete and hopefully get back into this Ashes series.”
