All-Rounder Moeen Ali Wants To Bat At No. 5 For England

Dec 17, 2016 at 6:08 PM

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All-Rounder Moeen Ali Wants To Bat At No. 5 For England

The English all-rounder Moeen Ali has stated that it’s quite challenging to bat at different positions and had desired to bat at number five for his national side for the long period in top-tier cricket.

Swapping the batting position, Moeen opened the inning against Pakistan before batting at number five in Bangladesh and concurrently number four in India. On most occasions, he has batted at number eight.

“It is tough. When you haven’t got a consistent number, then it is quite tough to be consistent. Wherever the team needs me, I’ll bat, but hopefully one day I’ll have a spot to myself,” Moeen Ali told Sky Sports in an interview.

In the fifth and final Test against India in Chennai, Moeen came to bat at number four and scored a blistering century. Comfortable against spinners, Moeen also completed the milestone of 1,000 Test runs in 2016.

“I was batting five at the start of the tour and with the balance of the side, I ended up batting at number four. It is a good position to bat but, being an all-rounder, I’d love to bat number five in the long run. These things happen. They were bowling a good pace at the time and it was a bit two-paced but I just felt to take it on was the best option at the time,” Moeen added.

The Worcestershire lad was tested with some shorter deliveries which he controlled well but eventually was undone by a short ball on 146 off 262 balls by Umesh Yadav when Ravindra Jadeja completed the catch at the deep mid-wicket region.

“I’m pleased with the hundred and to get the team out of a little bit of a hole at the start and what matters is that I got the 146. This year it (the batting) has gone quite well. To get the four hundreds this year, I’m pretty pleased with it,” Moeen remarked.

The 29-year-old also acknowledged that it is not going to be an easy job for our bowlers to take all 20-wickets at Chepauk Stadium, which seems a batting friendly wicket.

“It is going to be very hard. it is a tough challenge but, for us to win the game, we are going to have to take the 20 wickets and we’ve got three days to do that. This evening I tried to bowl a bit different. Normally I just try and bowl the same ball every time. I mixed it up a little bit to see what happens,” he concluded.

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