England began their second tour match against CA XI at the Adelaide Oval in Adelaide on Wednesday and finished at 293 in their first innings.
England top-order batsmen got good starts but couldn’t consolidate on the start and lost wickets at crucial stages of the innings. England could have been in a much better position had they not lost three wickets in the last five overs of the day.
Three of England’s top five batsmen scored half-centuries but couldn’t build on the start. Alastair Cook and James Vince also started well but lost their wickets at crucial stages. Dawid Malan top-scored for the three lions as he scored 63 but like others lost his wicket at an important stage of the day and couldn’t capitalize on the start.
CA XI declared their first innings at 233/9 as England began their second innings and is currently in a good position at 89/1. England’s top scorer Malan in a press conference said that he is ready for the on-field and off-field banters. Australians are best known for their verbal spats with the touring players and Malan said that he prepared for the hostile Aussie crowd if he is selected in the middle order.
He said:
“It’s the whole challenge of an Ashes series, I’m actually looking forward to seeing what I get called, what sort of lines they have. They do say most of the lines are funny. I think you probably get the odd guy that crosses the line a few times. You’ve got to learn to deal with that.”
Malan was born in London but moved to South Africa at the age of seven, he then returned to England eleven years later for a short stint of coaching at Northamptonshire but never returned.
“I was born in England; I have lived in England for 19 years of my life. I’m as English as they come, If people want to give me stick about my old man moving to South Africa and taking me when I was seven, then so be it – I didn’t really have a choice. I probably will never move back to South Africa, as much as I enjoy the country and as good as the country has been to me. England is my home and that is where I see my future.”
Malan made his debut against South Africa but failed and had almost given up on playing Test cricket again and the thought of playing in the Ashes never crossed his mind:
“I never imagined I would be playing one. Even if someone had said to me last year you would be playing in an Ashes, I would have probably laughed at them.”
Now being a part of the Ashes squad he said:
“You don’t want to be a casualty, you want to … play all five Tests, that is the goal, For me personally, every Test series is about scoring runs and about scoring as many runs as you can – it’s your career, it’s your future.”