Alex Hales felt he was making his England debut once more when he returned from a 31/2-year exile and anchored them to a victory over Pakistan within the first Twenty20 of the sequence.
Hales returned to England’s colours for the primary time on Tuesday as his second failed check for leisure medicine pressured him out of the 2019 Cricket World Cup. He scored 53 runs in 40 balls as England chased down the goal of 159 with 4 balls to spare. “After three years there was always the nerve and the pressure coming back. Three years felt like forever,” Hales mentioned. “It felt like a begin once more.
Coming again with a half-century and contributing to a profitable staff appears like a dream come true. ,
Hales was planning subsequent month’s T20 World Cup in Australia when Jonny Bairstow was badly injured whereas enjoying golf and was dominated out of the mega occasion.
Hales struggled to get going within the first six overs of the batting powerplay, however the 20s blossomed after being dropped twice as he scored his fifty off 39 balls and reached a fine-leg boundary in opposition to pacer Haris Rauf.
Hales and Harry Brooke dominated the Pakistan pacers on the finish of the run chase with some fluent boundaries. “The deeper you go into it, the more fluent the innings becomes,” he mentioned. “I finally took off some boundaries and ended the game with Harry.” During his exile from worldwide cricket, Hales featured prominently in home T20 leagues around the globe, together with within the Pakistan Super League.
The stadium was crammed to a capability of about 34,000 on Tuesday to look at England’s first match in Pakistan in 17 years. “I’ve been lucky to have played here in front of full houses before and it’s great,” Hales mentioned. “It’s one of the best places to play cricket in the world and the fans really put on a show.” The second T20 is on this floor on Thursday.
With inputs from TheIndianEXPRESS
