The charismatic England and Chennai Super Kings all-rounder, Moeen Ali has revealed that he was initially a seam-bowling all-rounder, but a bad back while bowling full tilts while playing under-15 for Warwickshire forced him to turn to spin. forced to
Moeen recently made headlines when he announced that he was ready to walk out of Test retirement if new England coach Brendon McCullim and captain Ben Stokes wanted to. He retired from Test cricket in September last year to prolong his white-ball career.
Moeen Ali likely to be out of Test retirement, cricketer tells new coach McCullum – report
For CSK this year, he scored 244 runs in 10 matches with a best of 93, along with eight wickets, although his team finished ninth in the 10-team. IPL 2022 season.
Talking about his childhood memories, Moin told chennaisperkings.com that his cricketing journey as a child started with playing the game with Indian and Pakistani players.
“School was the best day of my life. I had very good friends and a good school (Moseley). I loved cricket and we had a nice cricket ground and it was a South Asian background school. Indian, Pakistani… So obviously everyone loved cricket.
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“We won at the national level, we beat private schools and in the four years we played, we lost only two games. Our side was very good. All the county players we were playing with at the time, we came up against them all; We defeated them. We also played against (England great) Alastair Cook’s school.
The 34-year-old said that at that time, he was trying his best to be a fast bowler, even appearing for seam bowling trials everywhere.
“I was doing everything. I was a seam bowler at that time and I took my trials as a seam bowler who can bat. It was more difficult to bat but I was fine. I remember hitting six And I remember I told my father that I got the six and I am very happy with it.
“It was during my under-15 days that I switched to spin bowling. I had a bad back bowling seam while playing under-15 for Warwickshire. Then, I just threw an off-spinner in the net and the coach looked up and he was like ‘no more seam bowling, you’re going to be a spinner from now on’. He obviously saw something in my bowling and he said that I will be a spinner from now on. And that was it,” revealed Moeen.
Moin said that he had a very difficult childhood and at times his father could not afford a car or even petrol for some basic essentials.
“At first we were not very good; We didn’t have much money. My dad had a job, he worked as a psychiatric nurse, which means you have to see people struggling mentally and stuff in the hospital. But at the same time, he had to take me and my brothers to county games, trials, and training. He couldn’t buy petrol, he couldn’t eat sometimes. it was very difficult. Sometimes the three of us played a game on the same day, a county game that was really unfortunate. My father had to leave his job.
“We had a car, a terrible car between two families and so once we had petrol and everything, we had just a pound left for the whole day. We had to have bread, sometimes cucumber and sandwiches. That’s the struggle… and it wasn’t just my dad and uncle. It was my mother and aunt, getting the clothes ready, making sure everything was on time. It was always kind of a hurry. Very tough times, but the best of times,” he said.
But once he got into professional cricket, life changed and Moin says the thought of years of struggle gives him goosebumps.
“Just thinking about it now gives me goosebumps because you wonder where you come from and it’s a great reminder to me about my own humble background. I turned professional very quickly and things just kept getting better and better. I’m really grateful for today.”
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