Former World no.1 batter Dawid Malan has announced his retirement from all forms of international cricket. The 37-year-old hasn’t played a T20I since September 2023 and has faced continuous snub from the selectors. He was ignored yet again from the T20I squad against Australia as the selectors infused young blood into the team. The left-handed top-order batter will continue to play franchise cricket in leagues across the world.
Malan feels he exceeded his expectations in white-ball cricket. However, he rues not making the opportunities in Test cricket count.
"Test cricket was always the pinnacle for me growing up," he told The Times. "At times I played well but in between just wasn't good enough or consistent enough, which was disappointing because I felt I was a better player than that.
"I took all three formats extremely seriously but the intensity of Test cricket was something else: five days plus the days building up. I'm a big trainer; I love hitting lots of balls and I'd train hard in the build-up, and then the days were long and intense. You can't switch off. I found it very mentally draining, especially the long Test series that I played, where my performances dropped off from the third or fourth Test onwards."
"But, you know, on the field I always did what I felt was right to win a game for the team. I never walked off the field if I got runs not caring about whether we had won or lost. It was always about winning and I'd always question myself as to whether I'd made the right decisions on the field to do that."
Malan’s numbers in international cricket
Malan is England's fourth-highest run-scorer in T20Is with 1,892 runs from 62 games at an average of 36.38 including one century and 16 fifties. He averages 55.76 in ODIs with 1,450 runs from 30 innings featuring six centuries and seven fifties. He played 22 Tests as well and scored 1,074 runs including one century and nine fifties.
Malan's achievements
Malan is only the second England batter to score a century in all formats of international cricket after limited-overs skipper Jos Buttler. He holds the record for the quickets to 1,000 runs in T20Is from just 24 innings. He was a part of England's T20 World Cup 2022-winning squad. However, he could not play in the knockout stages after suffering a groin injury.
Malan yet to excel in IPL
Despite his performances in international cricket, Malan is yet to get a long run in the Indian Premier League (IPL). He was picked for his base price of Rs 1.5 crore by Punjab Kings (PBKS) but got to play just one game where he scored 26 runs against Delhi Capitals. It will be interesting to see if he makes his IPL comeback after retiring from international cricket.
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