Malan stands and delivers

After the second day of the first Test against Windies at Edgbaston in August, Dawid Malan had told the assembled journalists that he had found the step up from county cricket to be a challenge. The media scrutiny was, he said, more intense, the bowling was better and there was certainly more pressure. At that stage, the jury was still out on Malan as a Test match batsman. Not now.

Malan made 65 that day in Birmingham, his first half-century, and followed it up in the next Test at Headingley with 61. The second of those innings was a tortuous affair and few who were there to witness it will have seen much to convince them that Malan had the technique or the range of shots to prosper at Test level. Yet the 186-ball knock suggested the left-hander was prepared to graft and fight, characteristics that any good international batsman needs.