Former England all-rounder Moeen Ali believes Shubman Gill’s combative on-field attitude during the Lord’s Test was similar to Virat Kohli’s blazing energy, and may have unintentionally created a more dangerous version of the England team.
Aside from Indian captain Shubman Gill, Mohammed Siraj was also seen giving the England hitters a mouthful at the Home of Cricket.
However, magnifying the intensity appeared to backfire for the tourists, as they lost by 22 runs, giving England a 2-1 lead with two games left in the Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy.
“My take is that everything is fine. I believe he is only trying to be competitive in front of a fight, which, like Virat, I believe is OK. But then, obviously, the other team, what you’ve done is, I believe, brought out the best of England, the fight, and the beast that England can be,” Moeen stated on the sidelines of the Global Super League (GSL) 2025, where he is representing Guyana Amazon Warriors.
“I believe it’s a different aspect of England. They’ve shown all of the players that winning the series is terrific. “I don’t understand why it’s being criticised,” he added.
I think played really well on that wicket: Moeen Ali
Moeen was particularly impressed by England’s batting effort in the third innings at Lord’s. He believes that the conditions were slightly easier for batting in the third innings than in the fourth. England were bowled out for 192 to set India a lead of 193. However, the Asian giants could only manage 170 runs before being rolled over. Moeen did praise KL Rahul, who scored a century in the first innings and 39 in the second.
“I think, at Lord’s it can happen. Because there’s always something for the ball, even though the period where it looked easy for batting, there’s always a few periods where… it makes it a little bit difficult. I think KL (Rahul) played really well on that wicket. But I think it was obviously a very close game,” Moeen Ali said.
“I think we were lucky, it was even to the closer level. England just scored a few more runs in the third innings, which was probably easier than it was in the fourth innings,” he added.
Moeen was also pleased with how England batted on the first morning of the Lord’s Test when the ball was moving around considerably.
“But I think the first morning at Lord’s, when it was doing a bit more, I thought England got through that period nicely. And I think to be 387 in the first innings there and in that situation, I think was a lot right,” Moeen stated.
India
