When you have been one of the most consistent young batsmen in England for five years yet have been treated shabbily by England, you must wonder whether you do indeed have friend - at least at the ECB. I have long advocated James Taylor as a batsman with the right temperament and nose for runs to warrant a decent run in the Test set-up.
As a prolific Leicestershire teenager in 2009 he won the PCA Player of the Year award and has since added some fine series of innings in one-day cricket, including last summer's domestic 40-over tournament. He has been a regular and mostly successful member of the Lions tourist squad, captain for one winter and a bedrock of the middle order. The fact that he represented a struggling Second Division county was held against him, not that it seems to hold back the likes of Alastair Cook, Ravi Bopara, Michael Carberry and James Tredwell. The powers that be advised him to seek a top-tier outfit for 2013, and Nottinghamshire duly snapped him up.
Last season he repaid them by scoring around 1700 runs in all competitions, outperforming Hales, Lumb and Patel in the CB40. However, a poor end to the summer probably ruled him out of Ashes contention, that and the emergence of Root and Stokes in England colours, both white and red. At 5 feet 6 tall, he was probably considered too short to take Jonny Bairstow's drinks-carrying duties, too. Most top cricketers play their best cricket on home pitches and struggle on less familiar turners or seam-friendly seamers, so it's great to see James Taylor make more than 400 runs in four matches in Sri Lanka, culminating in a magnificent 242 not out in this week's 2nd unofficial Test.
But, with Jonathan Trott and Kevin Pietersen likely to be absent this summer, and some of the other candidates losing their mojo in Australia, could the Lions performances bring Taylor back into the international reckoning? His two Tests against South Africa and pair of ODIs against Ireland didn't advance his claims at the time, but neither were they so disastrous that his career was rocked to its socks. He has done what he is asked and it's about time he gets the chance to re-establish a place in the middle-order against Sri Lanka in a few months' time. He has over 100 first-class fixtures under his belt, with an average approaching 50. Amazingly his List A average stands above 50, and few in the world can claim that.
Sam Robson has also been doing well with the 'A' team and with a start to match last season's opening games with Middlesex, could come into the reckoning as Cook's opening partner or maybe at three. With last summer's top scorer Moeen Ali also hammerion on the selectors' door, it will be interesting to see who, if anybody, could break into what has been a cosy closed shop of players in the wake of the winter Ashes debacle. I hope that Taylor's Lions innings and a few high scores in the Championship come April will win him enough friends amongst Giles, Whitaker et al. Andy Flower's successor may be the key man to impress, whoever he may be...
