You’re playing for England, Moeen Ali, not your religion

National identity is not always easy to define. The artist Wassily Kandinsky, for instance, was born in Russia, lived in Germany, and died in France. At various times he was a citizen of each of those countries, though posterity will judge him to be a German painter. Igor Stravinsky, also born in Russia, lived in France and America, and was buried at his request in Venice.

Or how about a man who is still with us? Daniel Barenboim was born in Buenos Aires to parents who were Russian Jews. Taken to Israel as a young boy, the pianist‑conductor has spent his adult years living in London, Paris and Berlin. An Israeli by choice, who has been granted honorary Palestinian citizenship, he will support Argentina at the World Cup. “I have multiple identities,” he told me some years ago in Chicago (another of his homes), “but my football loyalty will never change.”

Some things, he was saying, are in the blood. When it comes to sport, they have to be in the blood, otherwise what are you playing the game for, and for whom? That question arose at 1.55pm on Thursday when Moeen Ali, born in Birmingham 27 years ago to a Pakistani family, walked out to bat for England on a sunlit day at Lord’s.

It was a proud moment for Ali, a batsman who plays his county cricket for Worcestershire. As is customary at Lord’s, which boasts the most fair-minded audience in the whole of sport, he was accompanied to the crease by applause, and clapped again when he was out for 48 well-made runs. The fact that he is a Muslim was neither here nor there.

For Ali, however, it clearly matters a great deal. Before the Test he spoke of “representing the Muslim faith”, and of wearing his beard as “a label” and also as a “uniform” in the way that schoolchildren wore theirs. Oh dear. We are drifting into dangerous waters. It is better for all concerned to push the vessel back gently towards shore.

First, a beard can never be a uniform. Schoolchildren wear uniforms because it is a way of showing that, whether they are rich or poor, black or white, left or right, or inside-out, they all enjoy equality in the classroom. A man who belongs to a team and draws attention to his beard as a symbol of his faith is opting to stand out.

Next, membership of a national team can only ever represent one thing, and that is the country in whose name you take the field. It is restrictive, because you have to belong to that country, but as the England cricket team has in recent years been represented by players born in Ireland, South Africa, Zimbabwe, India, Pakistan, and all parts of the Caribbean where English is spoken, it is not that restrictive.

It never was. One of the greatest England batsmen of the so-called Golden Age, Ranji, was an Indian prince. Since then, the team has been captained by people born in Scotland, Wales, India, Italy, Peru and South Africa. One of the finest post-war captains, Nasser Hussain, was born a Muslim in Madras, as it was then called. And nobody was more aware than he of the responsibilities that came with being the captain of England.

For Hussain saw himself primarily as an Englishman who happened to be a Muslim. On account of this, he was subjected to occasional abuse from people who felt he had gone native. It took a good deal of courage to ride that storm but he showed the mockers they had picked the wrong man. Not many sportsmen are important figures in the world beyond their discipline. Hussain was.

The England team that is playing at Lord’s features, besides Ali, an Australian in Sam Robson, a Zimbabwean in Gary Ballance and a Bajan in Chris Jordan, with Ben Stokes, who was born in New Zealand, ready to return later this summer. Besides Muslims, Hindus and Sikhs have found acceptance within the England dressing‑room as well as players from other backgrounds. You can’t say that of either rugby or football.

If you want to know how people can rub along together, then take a look at English cricket. It’s not perfect. Many cricket-lovers have argued that too many “foreign” players come here as a matter of expedience, and the careers of Kevin Pietersen and Jonathan Trott, both South African-born, suggest they have a case. On the whole, though, English cricket is stronger for the players who have come here, from Ranji to Basil D’Oliveira, the Cape Coloured, who was denied a career in apartheid South Africa, to young Jordan. It shows what a tolerant country we are.

But there is one thing all players must acknowledge: if you are chosen to represent your country, that is who you represent. You may be a Hindu, a Sikh, a Muslim, a Buddhist, a Jain or (chance’d be a fine thing) a Christian but that is not why you have been chosen. If Moeen Ali does not understand this matter, then perhaps Peter Moores, the England coach, can have a quiet word in his shell-like. And if Moores does not understand, he should not be the coach.

Long before he became Bishop of Liverpool, David Sheppard played 22 Tests for England as a batsman, one of the finest of his day. Not once did he invoke the name of the Lord before he took guard. He relied on his gifts to define him as a cricketer, and to represent him as a man. So should Master Ali.

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Who really belongs in the comic pantheon?

_{Rik Mayall's zany, self-conscious humour tickled many people}

Icon. Genius. Legend. No sooner does a well-known person pass away than the tributes roll in, like the Danube. Well-meaning, no doubt, but usually wide of the mark. So it was with Rik Mayall, whose self-consciously zany humour tickled students 30 years ago. Bum, bottom, poo! I’m afraid it never did it for me.

Buster Keaton was a great comic figure, and Charlie Chaplin. Groucho Marx is certainly in the club, begging his pardon, and Woody Allen demands selection. Jacques Tati, too.

In our island the obvious candidates are Les Dawson, Frankie Howerd, Tommy Cooper, Eric Morecambe and Doddy. Barry Humphries, Dave Allen and the young Billy Connolly also make the list. Were they, are they, touched by genius? That’s one to ponder over the third pint.

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Television shrinks World Cup countries to cliché

_{^{Let’s dance: will Brazil’s footballers turn on the 'samba style’?}}

We learnt something remarkable this week: Brazilians like dancing. Turn on the telly, and there they were, lads and lassies in yellow shirts and not much else, leaping around like wild things for the benefit of the cameras. Whoever would have thought it? Now, we are promised, the Brazilian footballers will turn on the “samba style” as they attempt to win the World Cup on their home patch.

Talk about clichés. It’s as if every Englishman wore a bowler hat, every Frenchman cycled to work in a beret with onions hanging over his handlebars, and every German wore the froth from a stein of pilsner on the end of his nose.

This is the problem with coverage of the major tournaments. In trying to convey something of the spirit of the host nation, television merely confirms us in our prejudices, with a lot of tee-hee-heeing from the intellectual giants in the studio. There is an awful lot more to Brazil than samba and slums, but we’re not going to see it.

It promises to be a grim month.