Moeen Ali Calls David Warner A Clown, Rubbishes His Comments On Joe Root

The Ashes is still a few months away; however, the verbal yorkers and bouncers have already started happening between the English and Australian players. The first such poke came from David Warner, who questioned Joe Root’s record in Australia, and said that with the kind of technique he has, Josh Hazlewood would dismiss him easily Down Under. 

“The way that he brings down his bat playing on Australian wickets, it can bring him undone and I've seen it in the past," Warner said recently, on the sidelines of The Hundred, as quoted by India Today. 

"I think he will have nightmares before he gets over there about Josh Hazlewood. A bit like me and Broady. Joe is a hell of a cricket player. Look at the runs he has scored; the second leading run-scorer in the world. But I'm sure he'd like to score a hundred in Australia. It's one that has eluded him. I think that will be on his mind, so we will have to wait and see."

Responding to it on the Beards Before Wicket podcast, England cricketer Moeen Ali rubbished such claims and called Warner a clown for his unfounded comments.

“He’s just being Warner. He’s a bit of a clown, to be honest with you,” Moeen said. 

“He’s obviously trying to get into Rooty’s head—which he won’t. He’s not up for the whole banter thing. It’s just Warner, isn’t it?”

Moeen further elaborated how such mind games and sledges don’t work on Root, because he just doesn’t respond to them. Teams in the recent past have tried to disturb him at the crease using these methods, but they haven’t succeeded as India recently saw, where Root was the second highest run-scorer in the Anderson-Tendulkar trophy that was drawn 2-2. 

“Rooty’s scored so many runs now, he’s been through the whole thing, and it won’t affect him,” Moeen said. 

“India tried it, and it just didn’t work—clearly didn’t—because he scored loads of runs. But yeah, there are some players you can do that to, and others you can’t.”