Moeen Ali is a reborn Test hero under Bazball as Ben Stokes’ faith pays off
Moeen took two key wickets to break up Australiaâs middle order, including one Ricky Ponting called a âdream deliveryâ to dismiss Cameron Green
June 17, 2023 6:43 pm(Updated 6:44 pm)
EDGBASTON â Itâs a long way from a WhatsApp hunch to a wicket out in the middle, but thatâs how life plays out when you are Ben Stokes and a thought bubble pops into your head. Believe and it will happen. Ashes? You bet.
An hour into the afternoon session, the sun out, England toiling, the Hollies subdued, Edgbaston needed a hero. Who you gonna call? Moeen Ali of course.
We thought the Mo anthem was lost to Test cricket. A Ben Stokes hunch inviting Moeen to the Bazball party was answered without hesitation by the folk hero of English cricket. Mo had been going for more than four an over, the rate escalating via Travis Headâs bat.
Licensed to have a go, Mo kept trundling in regardless. As did Stokes, bringing Zak Crawley up to mid-on when others would have been lining the boundary rope.
Sure enough Head climbed into one. The ball picked out Crawley, who duly fished it out of the air. Cue abandon in the stands, the crowd fulminating as if the whole of Sparkhill were in attendance cheering on one of their own. The Ashes have been a painful experience for Moeen. One incandescent flare cannot repair the ledger to any great degree, yet atoms of serendipity like this might forever alter the way he feels about his role in the pageant.
It has been a tidy week for Moeen, soaring in the middle having earlier received the sanction of King Charles III with an OBE at Buckingham Palace for his services to cricket. Moeenâs father Munir, born to a very different Birmingham than the one we know today; intolerant, hateful, spiteful, cruel, must have a chest to rival Arnold Schwarzeneggerâs as well as a lump in his throat.
Munir could not have imagined when he returned to the city as an 11-year-old after spending his early years in Pakistan and speaking no English that a child of his might ever be serenaded by his peers in leafy Edgbaston three days after an audience with the monarch of the realm. Like centurion Usman Khawaja, also of Pakistani heritage, coming again as an Australian batsmen, Moeen has had to negotiate a largely white space.
The sanction hearing for Yorkshire, who have admitted four breaches of ECB directives in relation to the clubâs racism scandal, is due at the end of this month, reminding us of the prejudice players of colour still face in 21st century Britain. In this setting Moeen is loved like few others â the proof of that exploded across the greensward as Head made the lonely walk back to the pavilion.
Had Jonny Bairstow got his mitts to the ball two deliveries later, Moeen would have had further reason to celebrate. The new man in, Cameron Green, survived the yawning stumping chance to make it to tea unbeaten, adding 21 to the Australian total, precisely 25 percent of Khawajaâs contribution. You do the maths.
With Green motoring through the final session glove purists were chuntering whether Bairstow had dropped the Ashes with the failure to meet a routine task. Not in Bazball land. Not in Moeen country.
Up stepped the recast god of off spin, finding drift and savage turn to bowl Green through the gate. It proved the final wicket of the day, Khawaja called back to defend his shattered stumps after Stuart Broad was found to have overstepped the crease with the new ball.
