England's contract issue central to the international future for Moeen Ali
All-rounder is not on trip to South Africa with Test team and can plot career path on lucrative franchise circuit
Vic Marks
Moeen Ali lost his Test central contract with England in September after a run of poor scores. Photograph: Paul Childs/Action Images via Reuters
The size of England's tour party to South Africa betrays the uncertainties. A squad of 17 players is unusual given there are two warm-up matches and then four Tests in a row. Some of them – Matt Parkinson and Zak Crawley being the likeliest candidates – will be in the nets and in their bibs, enhancing their drink-ferrying capabilities for most of the tour.
One other, Mark Wood, will spend more time on the lonely rehabilitation road. It is quite a compliment to him that England are prepared to have him in the squad in the knowledge that he will not be fit at the beginning and that he will have no opportunity to prove his fitness in a match situation thereafter. Meanwhile, after the false start against Australia at Edgbaston last August there will be anxious glances in the direction of Jimmy Anderson when he takes to the field in the hope that his recuperation from his calf injury is complete. No doubt Saqib Mahmood, the solitary New Zealand tourist not to be picked, has been told to retain his fitness as best he can.
There are other uncertainties and they relate to Jonny Bairstow, who is back in the squad and Moeen Ali, who is not – at his own request. The selectors and Joe Root would not have had long conversations with Moeen if they did not wish to take him to South Africa.
Jonny Bairstow's Test recall raises questions about his role in South Africa
Bairstow has been offered a route back into the Test team, even if it is not the one that he would have chosen. Jos Buttler remains the first‑choice wicketkeeper so Bairstow will be battling for a batting place. There are no obvious vacancies in the middle order, where Joe Root, Ben Stokes and Ollie Pope, who made advances in his last innings, reside. The potential openings are at the top. It may be that Bairstow, despite being such a senior figure, has to impress in the warm-up games to demonstrate that he may be a better bet than Dom Sibley, which offers scope for Joe Denly to open and Bairstow to resume as a No 3. We have been down this road before and it seemed quite a rocky one. We wait to see whether Bairstow's omission from the Test tour of New Zealand makes any difference.
Bairstow cannot pick and choose. Better for him to play in the dreaded No 3 slot than not at all. Moreover, he is obliged to do so. Bairstow has a Test central contract to fulfil – unlike Moeen, who was not awarded one in September.
Moeen Ali's Test break to continue with absence from England squad for South Africa
The central contract system has been a boon for English cricket, but it retains the capacity to throw up some oddities. For example, Denly, who is currently a regular in the Test team but a peripheral figure in one-day cricket, does not have a Test contract but he does possess an ODI/T20 contract. Moeen has one of those so he will be obliged to go to South Africa for the white-ball segment of the tour if required, but he is under no compulsion to be part of the Test squad.
Moeen, while denied the income of a Test contract, now has the freedom to decide his availability for Test cricket. Hence Ed Smith when announcing the squad on Saturday could not guarantee that Moeen will be available for the tour of Sri Lanka, where his assets would be invaluable to Root, given the paucity of alternatives in the spin department. Last time in Sri Lanka England played three spinners with great success – Moeen, Adil Rashid, who also has an ODI central contract but not a Test one, and Jack Leach. As things stand Moeen has agreed to play in the Pakistan Super League, whose later stages coincide with that tour of Sri Lanka.
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The situation is tricky for the selectors; it is complicated for Moeen as well but also liberating. Unlike the cricketers of the past Moeen and an increasing number of others can plot their own career path. Now that he is not bound by a Test contract Moeen is in demand; leaving aside Worcestershire, which has always been a welcome haven for him, the T20 franchises around the world are interested in his talents. He has plenty of options open to him as cricketer away from the Test arena.
The one snippet of consolation for Root, who would like him back especially with Sri Lanka on the horizon, was relayed by Smith: that Moeen still feels he has Test runs and wickets in him. But that is a long way from a cast-iron guarantee of his return.
Moeen Ali
Jonny Bairstow