ENG vs IND 2018: Moeen Ali reaps rewards for shutting down social media accounts

Ali scored 50 on Day 1 at The Oval.

Moeen Ali scored 50 on Day 1. | Getty

Having followed his match-winning bowling performance of 9/134 in the fourth Test against India with an edgy but substantial innings of 50 in the first innings at Oval, Moeen Ali has said that he is reaping good rewards for keeping himself away from the social media networks and trying to bring in a better understanding and feel for real life. 

Amusingly, it is good that Moeen Ali is away from the virtual world for otherwise his innings on Friday, September 8, would definitely have been celebrated with a funny hashtag. It came across as him trying to deliberately edge it but Ali kept missing the ball for large part of his innings and eventually made a very substantial contribution of 50 to England's Day 1 score of 198/7. 

“I just felt like I spent so much time on there(social media)” said Moeen at the end of play on Day 1 and added, “You have family and kids, you get home and they want to play with you but you just end up on your phone. I caught myself doing that when my little one wanted a kickaround and I decided I’d had enough."

"It was a case of ‘can I live without it?’ I just feel sometimes that can take away communication and interaction. I was sick of it."

Moeen, who now has 2,594 runs at 32.42 and 142 wickets across 52 Tests for England, further talked about his promotion to no.3, which is speculated to be a futuristic decision by the team management under Joe Root. 

He said, "I don’t see why I can’t bat there or I can’t do the job. No matter where I bat I try to adapt to the situation. I prepared differently this week than before, against a newer ball." and added, "I just tried to played the line, I felt the ball was doing too much. Maybe I’m not good enough to nick them. At tea, the guys were calling me Geoffrey Boycott."

(Inputs from The Guardian)

 
 

By Kashish Chadha - 08 Sep, 2018

    Share Via