There must have been so many occasions as this game edged towards a conclusion and England wickets continued to fall that Bangladesh thought it was destined to be theirs. Instead, it belonged to Dawid Malan.
In a World Cup year every match becomes an audition and Malan aced this one, scoring a brilliant hundred to haul his side to victory in the first of this three‑game ODI series.
It is 17 years since Malan turned professional, six since he was first named in an ODI squad and four since his debut but this was just his 16th appearance in a format he once felt destined to for ever carry the drinks. Here in Mirpur, he carried the team, his second successive century for England seeing them home in a compelling, low-scoring contest by three wickets and with eight balls remaining.
His performance justified further the sales pitch with which he greeted Matthew Mott when the Australian was appointed as coach last May.
“I’ve been carrying the drinks since 2017 and seen a lot of other guys get given opportunities because of their age or whatever it is,” he said. “But as soon as you get a new coach it gives you an opportunity to sit down and speak to him, and because Motty hasn’t been involved in English cricket for a while he comes, watches and makes his own assessments without preconceived ideas, which a lot of people have.
“I told him not to pigeonhole me as a certain type of player: if you need me to bat No 5 I can, if you need me to open I can do that. Just tell me the role you want me to play, just give me the opportunity.”
He has got that and he grasped it. This was an innings of impressive patience, featuring a gap of 46 balls between boundaries, followed by three in six as he accelerated after the drinks break. That England had any chance of winning as the game entered its final stages was almost entirely down to the 35‑year‑old’s calm reading of the situation. The only constant being the increasing amount of pressure on his shoulders and ability to adapt to it.
Nobody on either side got within 50 of Malan’s 114 and no other England player managed more than the 26 Will Jacks contributed on his ODI debut.
Bangladesh are the masters of the low, slow Mirpur pitch, but here they met their match. It certainly helped that Malan was familiar with it: he has played 42 domestic games in this country, many of them on this ground, in 50‑ and 20‑over formats in six seasons, and his Twenty20 average is better here than in England.
There were several excellent performances from the home side, with the seamer Taskin Ahmed compelling and constantly threatening with the ball. But England would have won with relative ease but for their own indiscipline. Several batters were guilty – Jason Roy out via a leading edge in the opening over; Jos Buttler calmly and deliberately guided the ball straight to slip; Jacks attempted to clear the fielder at deep square-leg and failed – but particularly damning was the extras count: Bangladesh conceded just three runs; England 26.
They were a bit ragged from the off, Jofra Archer starting his day with a wide, a no-ball and a full toss, but he also personified their subsequent improvement – having leaked 12 from his first over he conceded 25 from his remaining nine.
Even with the benefit of a lightning outfield, the kind of surface that condemns fielders to forlorn chases as any ball that makes it past them skids away towards the boundary padding, Bangladesh’s scoreboard moved sluggishly.
Najmul Hossain Shanto, who came into the match with an ODI average of 14 and had scored in one of his three previous innings, was their outstanding batter with 58, but too many of the top order disappointed: Litton Das, Shakib Al Hasan and Mushfiqur Rahim scored 7, 8 and 16 respectively. When Bangladesh last played here, beating India in December, the same players scored 7, 8 and 12, but unlike on that occasion the lower order could not come to the rescue.
The total of 209 looked a little short and left England a clear path to victory if they could avoid unnecessary risk-taking and punish the poor deliveries. It was a path only one man chose to take; in the end, that was enough.
