The England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) declared David Malan’s retirement from international cricket on Wednesday, August 28. He amassed 1,892 runs in Twenty20 Internationals (62 matches), 1,450 in One-Day Internationals (30 games), and 1,074 in Tests (22 matches) across his career. After Jos Buttler, he is the second English batsman to score hundreds in all three game formats.
Malan, a late bloomer, lit up the stage in his T20I debut match against South Africa in 2017 by scoring 78 runs off of just 44 balls. Soon after, he made his Test debut, however he was only moderately successful. But in a 4-0 series loss against Australia in the 2017–18 Ashes series, he struck his only Test century at the WACA in Perth.
With his incredible batting achievements in T20I cricket, Malan established himself as an England force. He rose to the top of the ICC men’s T20I rankings in 2020, earning the title of number one. A few months later, in 2021, the left-handed batter made history by becoming the fastest player to 1,000 runs in Twenty20 Internationals, needing just 24 innings to attain this feat. Additionally, he was a member of the 2022 T20 World Cup winning squad.
Having not played for the Test team since the fifth Ashes Test in Hobart in 2022, the 37-year-old expressed his displeasure to The Times over not being able to return to Test cricket. He was happy with his performance in the limited-overs formats, though. For me, test cricket has always been the ultimate. It was disheartening because I thought I was a better player than that, even if I occasionally performed well. I was simply not consistent enough. Nevertheless, I performed better than I had anticipated in the white-ball formats. Malan gave his previous captain, Eoin Morgan, credit for encouraging him on the international front and giving him the confidence, he needed. “Eoin did a great job of calming things down and putting an end to the commotion. He was going to publicly support me if anything was printed or spoken. “I’ll be the first to tell you if there’s anything wrong with your way of playing,” he would say to me.
Malan’s international career has come to an end. He last appeared for England in the November 2023 ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup match against Pakistan.
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