England's confusing relationship with Moeen Ali in T20Is

Since Moeen Ali made his T20I debut in 2014, only 4 bowlers have taken more wickets for England in the 20-over format: Chris Jordan, Adil Rashid, David Willey and Tom Curran.

Both Rashid and Jordan are far, far ahead of the pack with excess of 60 wickets to their name. Willey and Curran have 38 and 29 wickets respectively. Moeen has 28.

All 4 of them have bowled more overs than him. And no one with fewer overs than him has more wickets to their name. The closest contender is Mark Wood, who has 26 wickets while bowling 24 more overs than Moeen Ali.

Willey and Jordan have bowled more overs than Moeen, while having played 10+ games fewer. And among these five bowlers, the averages and strike rates are so close together that it is not even funny:

Bowler	Economy	Average	Strike Rate
Chris Jordan	8.61	26.80	18.6
Adil Rashid	7.31	22.6	18.5
David Willey	7.99	22.4	16.8
Tom Curran	9.25	31.2	20.2
Moeen Ali	7.99	27.1	20.3

If the best bowler strikes every 17 balls, Moeen Ali strikes only 3 balls later. If the best bowler in the side gives up 22 runs before picking up a wicket, Ali gives only 5 more runs.

And he does that while being more economical than the average bowler.

England's Moeen Ali - the bowler

England v Sri Lanka - T20 International Series Third T20I

In fact, in the Top-10 test playing nations in the world, there are 55 other bowlers who have taken at least as many wickets as Moeen Ali. Among them, Moeen stands 46th in terms of overs bowled. But in terms of matches played? He is 21st.

That means there are 25 bowlers who have played fewer games than Ali while having bowled more frequently than him.

In fact, Ravindra Jadeja - who is arguably the greatest allrounder in the world right now in T20Is - has a worse strike rate than Moeen. So do Pakistan's Imad Wasim, India's Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Afghanistan's Mohammad Nabi.

In terms of average, Moeen's Ali's 27.1 is better off than Hardik Pandya, Mohammed Nabi, Andre Russell. And his economy rate is better than 23 other players, including big names such as Trent Boult, Kagiso Rabada and Ish Sodhi.

The point is Moeen Ali is good enough to play in any team, even as a pure bowler. And yet England don't let him bowl as often as he should. In the semifinal of the T20 WC, Moeen Ali did not bowl a single ball.

Moeen Ali - the batsman

England v South Africa - ICC Men's T20 World Cup 2021

So what happens when we take batting into consideration?

In the period since Moeen Ali started playing, 80 other players have scored more than the 529 runs he has made in his career. Of those, 35 have been openers. That leaves us with 45 other players who played between position 3 and 8.

Of those, everyone has faced more balls than Moeen except AB de Villiers, Hardik Pandya, Andre Russell and Glenn Philips. But only 19 have played more innings than he has, and only 14 have remained not out more than Moeen.

This is probably due to the fact that England have kept moving Ali up and down the order, all the positions between 3 and 8. And he has played the most number of his matches as a No.7 batsman.

With a career strike rate of 135, Moeen performs better than 60% of the other batters in this category. But he simply doesn't get enough balls. And when he does, like what he showed against New Zealand, he is more than a capable batsman.

Check out who is at the top of the points table of ICC T20 World Cup here.

Moeen Ali - the.... all-rounder?

However, despite all this, England simply do not seem to trust Moee Ali as a legitimate all-rounder. Chennai Super Kings have gotten more out of him in one season than England have all throughout his career.

Sometimes they treat him as a batsman, and sometimes they treat him as their fifth bowler. And in the best of scenarios, they treat him as someone who can do a little bit of both.

The truth is, Moeen Ali is an all-rounder who can do a lot of both and do them well. If only England had tried to get more out of him.

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