England's Moeen Ali vows to tame Australia's Nathan Lyon
Australian spinner Nathan Lyon dismissed England's Moeen Ali seven times when the Aussies whitewashed Ashes. Ali is ready for payback when the five-match ODI series begins on Wednesday.
England and Australia will play 5 ODIs from June 13-27 before the latter team's Zimbabwe tour for T20I triangular series that also involves Pakistan. England will move on to play India on home turf. But none of this will happen before a few sparks fly between the players.
According to a report by cricket.com.au, Ali is ready to deal with the off-spinner. "He bowled really well at me, I found him difficult in Australia but one-day cricket is different. I'm in a different mindset at the moment to what I was then," said Ali.
"He's bowled really well and got me out a few times. But you don't get medals for getting guys out all the time. Who cares? I'm just moving on.
"When we played in the Ashes in England, he never got me out once and nobody said anything. You just get on with it," he continued.
Nathan Lyon, on the other hand, believes that his county cricket stint with Ali has given him important information. He also has some tricks up his sleeves from playing Ali in Ashes.
"If you look back to the fields I had against Moeen Ali (during the Ashes), it was probably not the conventional left-hander's field. I had a deep mid-off, a deep cow corner and a deep square leg.
"I tried to take his boundary options out of it and see if he wanted to play the quiet game and try and nurdle me around," said Lyon.
The Aussie off-spinner agrees that Moeen Ali is an 'explosive player.' This is why it was important for him to play the mental game and take big shots out so that Ali will get defensive. Lyon wants Ali to defend more balls and make a mistake.
Ali still wants to remain a free spirit and hit it out the park in the series with Australia.
from Daily News & Analysis https://ift.tt/2LNFS0l
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