England have started their Ashes Test series with twin defeats against Australia. While lost the first Test in Brisbane by nine wickets, they faced 275 runs defeat in the second Test in Adelaide as well. However, they still have not given up on winning the series as their veteran batsman Dawid Malan has said that they will have to play with a much-improved performance in the third Test if they want to return to the series as well.
“The boys are hurting after our performances in the last two games,” Malan told reporters at the Melbourne Cricket Ground on Thursday. “We realise we haven’t been good enough across all facets of the game. The boys want to win, we want to win the series too. I know it’s a long way for us to come but we have to do well and play our best cricket in this test match to get ourselves back into the series.”
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While Dawid Malan has tried his best to do well for England with 82 in Brisbane and 80 in Adelaide, he again stated that he had to be better in rest of the games.
“Myself and (Joe Root) have been in the position to score hundreds in two innings and haven’t been able to kick on which has probably cost us about a hundred runs as a team at least, and that gets us back in the game,” he said. “Scoring 80’s good, scoring 180’s brilliant, so that’s the goal.”
However, both the England openers Rory Burns and Haseeb Hameed have failed to do well and their places in the playing XI have come under the scanner. And, there have been talks of including new faces too at the top of the order, including Zak Crawley. Even, Malan too said that he is also open to playing up in the order as well.
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“Zak’s a very talented player,” said Malan. “He’s a tall bloke who plays the short ball really well so there’s every chance that he’ll be really good here. I’ll bat wherever to play for England,” he said. “I don’t see myself as an opener but if they’d like me to, I’m happy to do what’s necessary.”
“(But) everyone’s up for a challenge, everyone’s really keen to face up to the Australians. We do it in white ball cricket, we try and take them on, so hopefully we can get that mindset and not just go into our shells and try and survive,” Dawid Malan concluded.
