Cliff Notes – Jonny Bairstow appointed Yorkshire captain for County Championship
- Jonny Bairstow has been named captain of Yorkshire, succeeding Shan Masood, as the club prepares for their return to Division One of the County Championship.
- Bairstow aims to lead Yorkshire to success in red-ball cricket while also seeking to regain his place in the England team ahead of a busy international schedule.
Jonny Bairstow appointed Yorkshire captain for County Championship
Jonny Bairstow has been announced as Yorkshire captain, following in the footsteps of his late father, David. Bairstow, who will take charge of the club upon their return to Division One of the County Championship next week, is part of a new leadership set-up at Headingley which will see Dawid Malan skipper in the T20 Blast.
Bairstow, born in Bradford, has comes through the ranks at Yorkshire, and played a prominent role in their last County Championship title win in 2015, with 1108 runs at an average of 92.33 from just nine appearances that season. By then, he had broken into the England team, and played three Tests against Australia that summer to help England secure the Ashes – the last time they won the urn.
Now 35, Bairstow finds himself out of the international reckoning, despite the fact he has six months remaining on an ECB central contract. He earned his 100th Test cap in the final match of England’s tour of India at the start of 2024, and made his last international appearance in June as England lost to India in the semi-final of the T20 World Cup.
Captaincy had been on the table for Bairstow since last summer following the decision to part ways with Shan Masood, now at Leicestershire, who had held the role for two years as the club seeked to emerge from the racism scandal that mired them in turmoil. Conversations progressed over the winter when Anthony McGrath left Essex to return to Yorkshire as head coach following the depature of Ottis Gibson, who secured promotion from Division Two in his final season.
The county is embedded in my heart
After not being picked up in the IPL mega auction, and with the ECB blocking players with red-ball commitments from taking part in the PSL, Bairstow will be available from the start of the season, which begins next week away to Hampshire.
“I am incredibly proud to have been named captain of Yorkshire,” Bairstow said. “The county is embedded in my heart, and I take immense pride in representing the club on the field.
“I’m very pleased and excited for what the season holds. We’ve got a great bunch of lads that have been working really hard over a period of time.
“It was fantastic, first of all, for us to get promoted last year after what has been a very tough couple of years for the club. But what I will say is how resilient the guys, especially the younger guys, within the group – who three years ago went through turmoil – have been.
“They’ve now got that in-built within them, and it’s started to come through not only because of the promotion but with the challenges that lead into Division One this year.”
While Bairstow makes no secret that he intends to force his way back into the England set-up, particularly with a five-Test series against India this summer, followed by an Ashes tour at the end of the year, he has his sights on ending Yorkshire’s wait for meaningful red-ball silverware.
“We need to be grounded in everything we do but you never say never. I firmly believe we are good enough to do it, whether it’s this year or further down the track, we’ll find out.”
Malan, who moved to Yorkshire from Middlesex at the end of 2019, was equally as enthused about the prospect of his own captaincy. Having signed a two-year extension last summer on what was initially a white-ball only contract, he will be involved for the start of Yorkshire’s Championship campaign given the limited availability of Joe Root and Harry Brook for the first six rounds leading into the opening men’s Test against Zimbabwe at Trent Bridge, on May 22.
A proud moment and exciting moment
“To be appointed captain in any format of cricket for Yorkshire CCC, with the history it’s got, is a proud moment and exciting moment as well,” Malan said. “It’s not only me with the new leadership, we’ve got a whole new leadership behind me with coaches and director of cricket. So it’s an extremely exciting time for the club and hopefully, you know, we can put some things in place that put white-ball cricket in a good place at Yorkshire.”
Malan has a distinguished record in the shortest format, helping England to their 2022 World Cup success having broken into a settled team through a run of form that propelled him to the top of the ICC T20 batting rankings in September 2020.
The 37-year old retired from international duty last year with 114 caps across all formats, having made his final appearance at the end of England’s botched 2023 ODI World Cup campaign, the first of three poor showings at ICC events in the space of 18 months.
“Do I still think I was good enough to play last year? Yeah, I do I think I was good enough to play,” Malan said when asked if his enforced retirement had been premature. “That’s ultimately not my decision.
“I wouldn’t say I was hard done by, I probably didn’t score as many run as I’d have liked in the T20 stuff for a little bit of a period, but especially … the 50-over cricket, I think the last year, year and a half I had performed in every series.
“But look, time moves on, cricket moves on, decisions need to be made and if you’re going to look back at every decision with regret or with bad or ill thoughts, it’s going to be a lonely world. I enjoyed my time with England and my time is done. My time has now been putting everything that I have into Yorkshire being as good as they can be.”
Huge underperformers in white-ball
Despite Yorkshire’s recent pedigree across all formats, certainly in terms of personnel, they remain huge underperformers in white-ball cricket. They are one of only four counties out of 18 who have yet to lift the T20 Blast, reaching Finals Day just three times, in 2012 (finishing as losing finalists), 2016 and 2022.
Malan is keen to change that, drawing from his wealth of international and franchise experience. Domestically, he was part of the 2008 Middlesex side that won the Twenty20 Cup, and was a vital cog for Oval Invincibles last year as they lifted the Hundred. Having been picked up by Headingley-based Northern Superchargers for this season’s competition, a stand-in captain for Yorkshire’s One-Day Cup campaign will be announced in due course.
“It’s surprising, actually because when you look at the teams and the players they’ve had, they’ve had some fantastic players over the years,” Malan said on Yorkshire’s limited-overs drought.
“I think that’s the challenge for us, trying to look at what we can to put things in place to make us a better team. We’ve come close at times, we’ve made in the last four years a quarter-final and a Finals Day, and we haven’t managed to go one better. It means we have a good base of white-ball cricket and it’s just fine-tuning a few things here or there.
“We’ve made some really, really good signings in Will Sutherland and Will O’Rourke. I think they’ve been really good additions.
“If you look at over the last couple of years, we’ve really struggled with injuries and being able to nail down overseas players for the full Blast and we’ve had them for bits and pieces. But to have guys that are going to be available for a good bit and that are actually going be able to bowl in the tough times, which we’ve probably not had the personnel available to us at all times with injuries. I think that’s going be a massive plus for us.”
