Moeen Ali

Profile details

FULL NAME

Moeen Ali

PLAYING ROLE

All-rounder

TEAMS

Balkh Zwanan

Two World Cups, one Platinum pick

Moeen Ali is Balkh Zwanan’s Platinum pick for APL 2026-27 — the second overall selection of the draft, taken for $100,000. The England all-rounder brings two World Cup titles, a Test hat-trick and 204 Test wickets to a brand-new club, and his APL career starts on 27 December 2026 in the UAE.

Team Balkh took Moeen at the players’ draft in Dubai on 3 November 2026, paying $100,000 — the highest price of the five draft categories. He joins a side captained by Afghan Icon Ibrahim Zadran, with Mickey Arthur as head coach and Tillakaratne Dilshan as mentor, alongside AM Ghazanfar, Gulbadin Naib, Qais Ahmad, Luke Wood, Muhammad Waseem and Thomas Moores.

What Balkh bought is a cricketer who has done both jobs at the highest level. A left-hand batter who can change a game in ten balls and a right-arm off-spinner with a Test hat-trick — 25 of his Test wickets came in one series, against South Africa in 2017 — he has played in every major T20 league there is and won the two biggest white-ball prizes in the game, the 2019 and 2022 World Cups with England.

He did not play in the first APL season in 2018; his name appears in none of the five squads that year, so his APL career starts in 2026. That makes him the most decorated player in this squad without an APL past — and the one Arthur will lean on hardest when a drafted side needs someone who has already won tournaments with strangers.

Role, style and draft pick

All-rounder — left-hand bat, right-arm off break, middle-order batter and frontline spinner.

Captain: Ibrahim Zadran. Head coach: Mickey Arthur. Mentor: Tillakaratne Dilshan.

APL 2026-27 numbers — none yet

The season starts on Sunday 27 December 2026, so no APL 2026-27 figures exist for any player yet — not for Moeen Ali, and not for anyone else in the league.

There are no APL figures for Moeen Ali yet. The 2026-27 season has not started, and he did not play in the 2018 season, so there is no 2018 row either. His first APL numbers will come after Balkh’s first match.

Where he fits at Balkh Zwanan

Moeen’s value to Balkh Zwanan is that he solves two selection problems at once. He bats in the middle order, where a new side most needs calm, and he bowls off-spin through the middle overs, where Balkh’s attack is built around Ghazanfar’s mystery spin and Qais Ahmad’s leg-breaks. With Gulbadin Naib and Colin Ackermann also in the squad, Arthur has three genuine all-rounders to balance a side that plays eight league matches against four opponents.

The format rewards exactly that kind of flexibility: a double round-robin, top four into the playoffs, 24 matches in all, ending with the final on Wednesday 20 January 2027. APL Schedule will carry Balkh’s dates once the Afghanistan Cricket Board publishes the fixture list, and the season’s full coverage sits on APL.