Yorkshire’s Dawid Malan left unbeaten on 99 as victorious England send out message to rivals

Quite what giant signs proclaiming such information as “4E” and “2C” actually meant was anyone’s guess, but as South Africa racked up 191-3 after choosing to bat, including 84 runs from the last five overs, perhaps they translated to “tell the bowlers to stop missing their lengths, Eoin” and “get them to put the ball in the right areas, son”.

According to the official word, Morgan is free to ignore such insights – Brian Close would probably have responded to them with a V-sign – and it is surely debatable whether Morgan could have remembered what the various codes were anyway in the heat of battle, or whether he would have had time to keep looking up to the dressing room as fours and sixes flew hither and thither.

As Michael Vaughan wrote on Twitter: “Signals sent from an analyst on a balcony to the captain on the pitch! The world has officially gone nuts!”

And, he might have said, Morgan would seem the unlikeliest candidate to need any such assistance.

In the end, though, after a thoroughly entertaining, run-strewn contest, the only message that counted was the one which England sent with a nine-wicket win completed with all of 14 balls to spare, Yorkshire’s Dawid Malan top-scoring with 99 and Jos Buttler striking 67, the pair sharing a T20 international record second-wicket partnership of 167.

It gave England a 3-0 series whitewash and sent them back to the top of the world T20 rankings to go with first position in the 50-over format. All they need now is the T20 World Cup in India next winter to confirm that they are the best white-ball team on the planet.

If their bowling still remains a work in progress (the Curran brothers, Messrs Sam and Tom, and, more unusually, Jofra Archer and Chris Jordan all conceded more than 10 runs an over this match), their batting more closely resembles the finished article.

It helps when you have the world’s No 1-ranked T20 batsman in your ranks, an accolade that sits increasingly comfortably on Malan’s shoulders.

After a man-of-the-match display in the second game in Paarl, where his 55 helped to clinch the series, the left-hander excelled again, adding another player-of-the-match accolade and the player-of-the-series title to boot.

What can one say? From the moment that they came together in the fourth over of the chase, after Jason Roy was lbw to Anrich Nortje, Buttler and Malan were sensational.

Their striking was so clean that it should have come with a “PG” rating on the one hand but, on the other, so X-rated that it should also have carried an “18” classification.

It was just such a pity that there were no spectators in the Newlands cinema to witness it.

Malan reached his fifty from just 26 balls, his fastest for England, and faced only 47 balls in total, striking 11 fours and five sixes.

Buttler, who took 34 balls to get to his fifty, received 46 deliveries all told and also struck five sixes to go with three fours.

South Africa’s bowling figures were best viewed after the 9pm watershed, Lutho Siplama (2.4-0-45-0) and Tabraiz Shamsi (4-0-57-0) taking particular tap.

If there has been criticism of Malan (and there is invariably someone having a pop in this day and age), it has been that he is not always the fastest of starters.

His response here was to smash his first two balls for four and his third delivery for six - “er, you were saying...”

In fairness, that England were set so stiff a target – or at least apparently so – was due to some equally devastating hitting from their fourth-wicket pair of Faf du Plessis and Rassie van der Dussen. They shared an unbroken 127 from the final 10.3 overs, van der Dussen making a T20 international career-best 74 from 32 balls with five fours and five sixes, and du Plessis contributing 52 from 37 deliveries with five fours and three sixes.

Adil Rashid was once again England’s best bowler, conceding only 20 runs from his four overs in what was an outstanding series for the three Yorkshire players on show - himself, Malan and Jonny Bairstow.

Ben Stokes was the most successful bowler with 2-26, the other wicket falling to Jordan, which saw him overtake Stuart Broad as England’s highest wicket-taker in the format with 66.

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