ALEX HALES England Player Cricketer

[Dr@g0n]

It is media day at a sun‑drenched Trent Bridge and after Nottinghamshire’s players pose for various photographs, larking around as they do so during a spring ritual that precedes another county season, Alex Hales sits down in front of the old pavilion for a chat. The England batsman may hail from south Buckinghamshire but this is home; the place where, in 2009 aged 20, he announced himself with a then futuristic 150 not out from 102 balls in a televised Pro40 match against Worcestershire; where he took the West Indies attack for 99 from 68 in just his fourth England outing three years later; where, in recent times, scores of 171 and 147 have powered Eoin Morgan’s trailblazing side to two world-record one-day totals. Come the World Cup there is a case for Hales to be among the first names on the teamsheet to face Pakistan at Trent Bridge in England’s second group game on 3 June. After all, it is a playing surface he claims to know.

“like the back of his hand” and one on which, in international cricket, his long-levered style averages 90 from seven innings via an eye‑watering strike-rate of 139. Alex Hales’ last-over heroics keep England’s T20 series with India alive Read more It’s a neat idea but one which may be funkier than the world’s No 1 team need to be. After all, as has been the case since he and Ben Stokes got tangled up in a street fight at 2.30am on 25 September 2017 following a one-dayer against West Indies in Bristol, Hales sits outside the first-choice XI. From having been central to the first half of Morgan’s revolution, he has spent 18 months as an overqualified first reserve, dropping in when injury allows but running drinks in the main, looking on while Jason Roy and Jonny Bairstow have forged one of the world’s most explosive opening combinations.

This is his first in-depth interview since the whole sorry saga was wrapped up last December when, for his part in it, Hales accepted two charges from the cricket disciplinary commission of bringing the game into disrepute. One was for the fight, the second for lewd images that circulated in the aftermath, with the commission handing down a six-match suspension and fines of £17,500 (four games and £10,000 of which were suspended for 12 months). As you might expect with a sportsperson, the on-field punishment hurt the most.
“I won’t lie, there have been days when it has gnawed away at me,” Hales says. “The fines and everything were a dent but the biggest thing was losing my spot. The day I found out I wasn’t playing [the final two ODIs against West Indies] I knew Jason would come in and score big runs. He’s too good a player. And Jonny was in the best form of his life. I saw it coming and it unfolded in slow motion.”

Hales is not looking for sympathy. The events that took place near the Mbargo nightclub were serious enough for him to know he cannot reasonably grumble about his lot. They have been well documented too, albeit with the three men who were tried on charges of affray – Stokes, Ryan Ali and Ryan Hale – offering conflicting explanations in court before ultimately all were cleared. Nevertheless it would be remiss not to ask Hales about certain aspects of his own involvement, not least having himself avoided a criminal charge despite video footage both of him kicking Ali during the melee, and then telling a police officer he was not present as Stokes was being arrested.

Were those kicks the real Hales? “Not really but it was just a sticky situation seeing a guy with a bottle on the ground. What do you do? Stand there and do nothing? He [Ali] could have glassed Ben and it would have been a hell of a lot worse. You have to make a decision in that time.

The guy had a weapon in his hand, he was on the floor and scrapping with a friend.” Ali told the trial he was holding the bottle in self defence. He said he had no recollection of going towards Hales with the bottle but accepted the video footage showed both that and that he struck another man with the bottle. His defence barrister, Anna Midgley, told the court Ali had been drinking from the bottle. “He didn’t arm himself but there came a time when he used it because he was threatened.

” There “may have been a misunderstanding” which caused the violence to erupt, she added. And how does Hales explain lying to the police – another aspect of the case that was shown on camera in court? “That is one of my real regrets from that night. It was just a really immature moment. I wish I’d said I saw exactly what happened and I was there – but I panicked. I didn’t want to make the situation worse. I just hoped Ben would be released in the morning and that would be the end of it. Nothing would come of it. “[Stokes] did say to me to disappear. But that is still a regret and watching the footage back I was just cringing, seeing myself lying. I just panicked and said something. I cocked up. The lesson is, tell the truth.” Like Stokes, Hales claims it was a case of stepping in to defend two others – clubbers Kai Barry and Billy O’Connell – from being assaulted, something Hale and Ali both denied in court. “I think every situation that could have resulted wouldn’t have been a good one,” Hales says. “All six of us wish we could go back to that night and all gone our separate ways.”
[ALEX|HALES]
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Edited April 18, 2020 by -Dark
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