File image of Dawid Malan© AFP
Dawid Malan, England's former world No. 1 T20I batter, has announced his retirement from international cricket at the age of 37. The left-handed batter announced his decision in an interview with British Daily 'The Times', following his omission from the upcoming white-ball series against Australia. Malan is one of only two England men's players, alongside Jos Buttler, to have scored centuries in Tests, ODIs, and T20Is. Despite this remarkable achievement, Malan had not featured for England since last year's 50-over World Cup in India.
"Test cricket was always the pinnacle for me growing up. 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. Then again, I exceeded all expectations of myself in white-ball formats.
“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," Malan told The Times.
In his career, Malan, who will turn 37 next month, played 22 Tests, 30 ODIs and 62 T20Is and scored 4416 runs.
He burst onto the international scene in 2017 with a stunning T20I debut against South Africa, where he scored a free-flowing 78 from just 44 balls. However, it was during the Ashes tour of 2017-18 that he made his mark in Test cricket, scoring a resilient 140 in Perth in partnership with Jonny Bairstow.
In the T20I format, Malan truly came into his own, especially after England's ODI World Cup triumph in 2019. He forced his way into England's T20 plans through sheer weight of runs, including a record-breaking 48-ball century against New Zealand in Napier. His consistent performances saw him rise to the top of the ICC's T20I batting rankings in September 2020, and by March 2021, he became the fastest men's player to reach 1,000 T20I runs, doing so in just 24 innings.
His prowess in the shortest format was further underscored when he played a crucial role in England's T20 World Cup victory in Australia in 2022, though he missed the knockout stages due to a groin injury.
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