Dawid Malan reflected on a bittersweet opening day of Yorkshire’s Rothesay County Championship clash with Worcestershire at Headingley after his delightful 98 underpinned a dominant 425-8.
Malan, having only just returned to red-ball cricket after a summer away last year, was excellent amidst a host of contributors after the White Rose advanced nicely having been inserted.
But there was obvious frustration that he fell just short of a deserved century, caught in the slips off New Zealand fast bowler Jacob Duffy.
The former England star said: “A little bit disappointed. To get that close and fall just before is obviously a bit frustrating, especially when we went nowhere for the last 10 or 12 overs and didn’t really rotate the strike enough.
“I thought Worcester bowled really well in that period and created chances and got themselves back in the game.
“But I think being put in on day one and being 400-ish has been a really good day for us.
“I think we were bowling as well (had Yorkshire won the toss).
“We’d left a lot of grass on because we wanted to make full use of that, and we knew the weather was going to be good and probably get drier and slower. So to try and get the first use of it, I think, was the idea, from my understanding, listening to the talks around.
“At the moment, it seems like a good toss to lose. But it depends how we bowl in the first innings.”
Yorkshire claimed four batting points, with the hope of a fifth tomorrow. In last week’s defeat against Hampshire at the Utilita Bowl, they failed to claim a single batting point.
“Yeah, we were short on points last week, so to get some batting points this week has been fantastic. Hopefully we can bowl them out and get those as well and then push for the win.”
Malan has spent part of his winter playing franchise cricket but returned to Headingley in the closing stages of the winter and says he heads into 2025 in good order, as a pair of scores in the thirties at Hampshire last week suggested.
“I’ve hit the ball really well since I’ve been back,” he said. “I had a good two or three-month break and have done a bit of work with the coaches here.
“I didn’t go on the pre-season tour, and I spent a lot of time with Bilal Anjam, one of our Academy coaches, in the Indoor School here and hit a lot of balls, which is probably the area that I like the most – doing things by myself and working on my game.
“And, you know, thankfully it’s paid dividends so far.”
And Malan is confident that Yorkshire can have a good season, putting their opening week frustrations behind them quickly.
He added: “We’ve got a lot of batters, and we’ve got a couple of overseas arriving in the next two or three weeks.
“I think that makes a massive difference, the depth of the bowling.
“It’s always been the issue since I’ve been at Yorkshire. We’ve always had a lot of injuries and, you know, guys suddenly not available and so on.
“So, hopefully this year, with a couple of overseas, we have that depth.
“We’re going to lose games of cricket. That’s part of Championship Cricket. I don’t think anyone wins the Championship without losing.
“We’ve lost one, which is annoying, but hopefully we can get the momentum here before some of our overseas come and start adding some firepower to our attack.”
