Pakistan star Hasan Ali “very excited” to learn from Anderson at Lancashire

Hasan Ali has said he is “very excited” to play alongside James Anderson and pick his brains during a stint at Lancashire which will see him feature in six County Championship games

Pakistan seamer Hasan Ali is gearing up for his first experience of county cricket, having inked a deal with Lancashire which will see him play six County Championship matches.

The 27-year-old is coming off the back of an excellent year in Test cricket, having ended 2021 as the third leading wicket taker with 41 at 16.07. Above him were India spinner Ravi Ashwin and Pakistan teammate Shaheen Shah Afridi, while directly below him was England legend James Anderson.

Anderson picked up 39 wickets at 21.74 last year and, after getting dropped for England’s recent tour of the West Indies, he is set to feature in four of Lancashire’s six matches before England’s first Test of the summer against New Zealand in June. And Hasan is relishing the opportunity to play alongside the veteran seamer and pick his brains, admitting he has “a lot of questions to ask him”.

Speaking ahead of Lancashire’s first game of the season, Hasan said: “I’m very excited and looking forward to sharing the dressing room with their players. Obviously, we have Jimmy bhai, Jimmy Anderson, so I’m very happy and very excited.

“I never spoke with him before, but now I’m going to have a lot of questions to ask him. I’m going to disturb him. We know he’s a great bowler. He swings the ball both ways. I’m going to learn how he swings the ball both ways, especially the cross-seam ball. I’m going to learn it.”

By joining Lancashire, Hasan is one of ten Pakistan players who will feature in county cricket this season, along with Azhar Ali, Haris Rauf, Mohammad Abbas, Mohammad Rizwan, Naseem Shah, Shadab Khan, Zafar Gohar, Shan Masood and Afridi. “I think that is a pretty good sign for Pakistan cricket,” he added.

“We have nine or ten players who are going to play this season and I think that’s a very good thing for us as a unit. We’re going to get a lot of experience from here and we’ll put it into our domestic and international cricket.

“Since childhood, honestly, we’ve heard about county cricket. [People say that] as a professional, you should play county cricket because you’re going to learn a lot of things from there. I’m going to follow in Wasim Akram’s footsteps here. It’s a good opportunity for me.

“I’m here for the first six games and I am going to get a lot of wickets for my team, Lancashire. Fingers crossed. Let’s hope I will take wickets.”