Section:GDN 1N PaGe:42 Edition Date:190731 Edition:01 Zone: Sent at 30/7/2019 20:31 cYanmaGentaYellowb
- The Guardian Wednesday 31 July 2019
(^42) Sport
Cricket Ashes countdown
Raring to go
‘It would be
great to send
Australia home
with nothing’
Moeen Ali
T
he Ashes are the
pinnacle of Test cricket
for any England player,
and if we can follow up
our World Cup victory
by winning back the urn
from Australia it would represent
one of the greatest summers for the
sport in this country.
It would be quite an English
thing to say we need to come down
from the extreme high of that day
at Lord’s, however. Everyone in
the squad would do anything to
experience it all again but what we
can do is harness the feelings and
confi dence it gave us, not try to
suppress them.
Thinking back to the end of the
last Ashes series, when Australia
celebrated on the outfi eld of the
Sydney Cricket Ground with those
oversized hands on the podium
rubbing in the 4-0 scoreline, it was
obviously a very diffi cult time. Quite
upsetting, really.
But those are the moments as
cricketers when you make a pledge
to yourself that next time around
it will be diff erent. From my point
of view, it would be great to send
Australia home from nearly six
months in the country with nothing
to show for it.
Starting this series at Edgbaston- for me the best ground in the
country for home support, and
probably the toughest for a visiting
team – is a big plus. It was only a
couple of weeks ago that we beat
Australia convincingly in that World
Cup semi-fi nal. That match will be
in their minds and the plan is to hit
them hard again.
But clearly this only goes so far.
Test cricket is a diff erent ball game
and we respect our opponents. It
will be my third Ashes but I expect
this one to be a bit diff erent in terms
of on-fi eld relations. It’s well known
that I have personally received some
abuse in the past but Australia are
actually quite nice to play against
these days.
They decided to make a positive
change to their cricket after the
ball-tampering thing blew up in
South Africa last year and credit
must go to Justin Langer, their head
coach, and their two captains, TimPaine and Aaron Finch, because they
have turned it around in the space of
18 months.
As a team we tend to focus mainly
on ourselves, however. And in an
Ashes series the best approach as
a player is to not get caught up in
feeling pressure for your position
but to think only about the greater
cause. How can I contribute? It could
be a single moment, like a blinding
catch or a run out. Think only of the
team’s needs.A
s an all-rounder I can
aff ect every innings
of the game but in all
honesty I know my
batting has been a
problem of late. Given
I’ll probably be coming in at No 8,
my primary role is with the ball
and since returning to the side last
summer against India my record has
been strong in this department.
I have accepted this for a while,
the ball has been coming out nicely
and in Test cricket the wickets have
followed. But I would be lying if I
thought the attention was on this,
because even though I am not
on social media these days, I am
aware of the criticism of my batting
in recent times.
I have always been a player whose
form goes up and down but at the▲ Australia celebrate winning the
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