Can I preface this by saying that Moeen Ali is, on balance, my favourite cricketer?

Certainly, he’s England’s most underrated in recent times. A genuine match-winner with the ball – just look at that strike rate – with a sensational fourth-innings record and, at one point, a proper all-rounder, capable of locking down a spot in the top six and serving as a frontline bowler. He has brought more joy to England fans than he is often given credit for. He is a double World Cup winner, an Ashes winner, and will be remembered as a great of English cricket.

All of which is a prelude to saying: Moeen probably won’t be a success at No.3 in the Ashes. Not by the conventional metrics, of runs and averages, if it’s not now too gauche to reference such staid statistics. The recent numbers are not encouraging. Moeen has a high score of 60 in Test cricket since 2017, and he has averaged less than 20 in that time. Sure, first-drops sometimes fall early. Ollie Pope said last year that batting at No.3 is “only one ball different from No.4”, an indicator of how it’s possible to adjust, but also of the perils of the post. But there is usually an expectation that at some point a No.3 will make a contribution. With Moeen, that’s a faint hope. And even he knows it. “That would be amazing obviously,” he said, when asked if he can fulfil the dream of making an Ashes hundred. “But you’ve got to be a bit more realistic.”

And yet somehow, still, this move makes a kind of warped sense. There is a cricketing argument. You can see glimpses of the batter Moeen once was if you really want to, perhaps in the 46 first-innings balls faced at Headingley, or the improvement in his T20I returns in 2022. These days, you should always expect the unexpected, and nothing would be more so than Moeen peeling off a hundred at Old Trafford. Even a few starts might be enough. See off the openers and the first change, make them wear down the ball with a bouncer barrage, allow those beneath to get going against the greenhorn spinner and the all-rounders.

It’s the effect on everyone else that’s key. With the captain unable to bowl, this is the only way to balance the XI, with Moeen as the spinner and four other quicks. Then you have to figure out the order from there.

Sherlock Holmes probably wasn’t talking about England’s No.3 conundrum when he said, “when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth”. but it fits. Joe Root: could but won’t. Harry Brook: would but shouldn’t. Ben Stokes: best left with the tail. Jonny Bairstow: don’t even think about it. Moeen is willing, and you’re not sacrificing much by moving him from No.7. And once you do that, everything else fits.

It’s crucial that Moeen wants this. It was he who approached Brendon McCullum with the idea ahead of Headingley’s final day, explaining how he wanted a proper piece of the action. There’s a sad sweetness here. Moeen has spent his whole career getting messed around, without his full value being celebrated. Now he has finally found himself in a team that loves him for who he is, and he’s realised he misses the nonsense. He is raring to go. Maybe that’s enough.

England have made a virtue, much mocked by the Aussies, of feeling like they’ve won even when they’ve lost. And this is a move that can’t really fail, because the hope of individual success is remote. Should anyone from No.4 down make a score, England will argue that Moeen being at No.3 was part of the reason why.

Still, there is an oddness here, in picking, essentially, a sacrificial No.3 so everyone else can feel normal. England have removed much of the mystery of Test cricket, done what they can to challenge the assumed orthodoxies and received wisdoms that have weighed down sides of the past. Now here they are moving things around to ensure Root and the rest can have their favourite numbers next to their names. And yet it does look safer. Bairstow at seven and Chris Woakes at eight. That feels good. Some players do just play better when they are where they want to be.

The greater triumph here is in overturning the narratives of Ashes past. It’s standard for any encounter with Australia to see England’s plans ripped apart. It’s a fun game, at the start of any tour, to try and predict their XI for the final Test, but even the most creative of England fans wouldn’t have had Moeen Ali at No.3 for half of an Ashes series at the start of June. But here we are, and it doesn’t feel like madness.

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