Dawid Malan: "Yorkshire Can Be Strong Across All Formats"
Dawid Malan believes Yorkshire can be successful across all formats of domestic cricket during the 2024 season, even after the England veteran elected to turn his focus towards white ball cricket.
The 36-year-old announced his plans to stop playing first-class cricket back in the Autumn during England’s unsuccessful defence of the Cricket World Cup in India – where he played in all nine games and hit a highest score of 140 in the victory over Bangladesh.
Whilst that means Malan isn’t part of Yorkshire’s County Championship programme this year, on the pitch at least, he will continue to represent the County in the T20 Blast – a form of the game where he has notable success during his career.
That includes being the fastest batsman to reach 1,000 international T20 runs, and being part of the England squad that secured the T20 World Cup title in 2022.
Playing in multiple forms of the sport in recent years however – domestically, internationally and in the various franchises - brought with it plenty of challenges, with Malan taking the decision to restrict how much cricket he will now play going forwards.
“It was a very tough decision and to be honest, I’m itching to play four-day cricket,” he said. “The schedule last year was very tough at the time as I was playing for England, trying to play four-day cricket for Yorkshire, plus T20 and then also spend time with my family as I’ve got two young kids who I want to spend time with.
“When you are playing four-day cricket, you’re leaving before 8am and then not getting home until after 8pm so didn’t get to see the kids, and towards the end of the Blast – when you are also playing four-day stuff in between – it just killed me both physically and mentally.
“Something had to give, and it was four-day cricket. I’m not saying that I’ll never play it again but for now, that is the decision I’ve taken.”
Although no longer set to appear on the pitch for Yorkshire in the County Championship, Malan will continue to work with the four-day squad as he looks into the options available for the time when his playing career draws to a close.
“I don’t think I’m going to make a good spectator, but one thing I would like to do is to come into the club and help out where I can with the first and second teams,” he said. “I’d like to to see if I enjoy the coaching side of things and can pass on some of my knowledge to the younger players, and see if it [coaching] could be an option for me in the future.
“It’s a bit of a scary time when you have been doing something professionally since you were 18 years old, and now I’m sat here at nearly 37 wondering what I’ll be doing in two years. For now, I want to do as much as I can – almost like work experience – and see what I enjoy for my post-cricket career.”
Yorkshire’s season so far has been impacted by the weather – something Malan admits is ‘frustrating but part and parcel of cricket in England’ – but confidence remains high about the chances of success for the County as it bids to gain promotion in the four-day game and battle for one-day honours.
“I feel we are well placed after two years under new coaching staff which has taken a bit of time to bed,” Malan added. “We have been close at times in the last few years but haven’t been consistently good enough to win a tournament. We’ve played some good cricket and there were matches in the County Championship where we were dominant at times, but we couldn’t quite finish them off.
“If we can win more games, particularly at home, then I think we’ll be in a good position to challenge for promotion from Division 2, but I’m also confident we’ll be strong across all formats of the game. On paper, we have a strong squad, and if everyone plays as they should, then we should be pushing for success across the board.
“On a personal level, I want to contribute to games of cricket and if it helps us to win trophies, then even better. I’ve never been the kind of player who looks to score 1,000 runs or who is looking to score 5,000 runs, it’s all about winning games of cricket. For me, that’s the number one goal this year.”
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