Limelight beckons Collingwood

6 May 2006

Paul Collingwood is not taking his place in the England Test side for granted

Patience should be Paul Collingwood’s middle name. The Durham all-rounder bided his time for the best part of two years before being given a run of games in England’s Test side and the modest 29-year-old is still refusing to take his place in the team for granted.

“I still don’t think I’m established,” he said, even though the record books show he has played all but one Test since being thrust into England’s biggest match for a generation - last year’s final Ashes encounter.

Perhaps his cautious words stem from the knowledge that he owed his call-up for the fifth Test at The Oval to the injury which befell Simon Jones.

A similar situation hastened his selection during the winter tours of Pakistan and India when a number of key England players were struck down.

Collingwood enjoyed a productive tour of the sub-continent © Getty Images

But Collingwood’s batting performances on the sub-continent will surely have guaranteed him his spot in the side for the summer Test series with Sri Lanka, regardless of who else is available.

The man himself is not yet so sure as he seeks to finally shed his pigeon hole as a one-day specialist, thanks to 91 ODI caps which so far outweigh his eight Test appearances.

“I’ve obviously played five Test matches over the winter, but you still have to think of the players who are coming back in - Marcus Trescothick, Michael Vaughan,” he said.

“These are top-class batsmen who will have to come back in the side at some point.

“So I cannot say I’m a definite, dead cert.

“There’s still a lot for me to give to that team before I’m a dead cert on that team sheet.

“But, of course, I would’ve taken everything that’s happened; I’m a lot closer than I was last year, put it that way.

Collingwood is already an established member of the one-day side © Getty Images

“I’ll just have to keep on doing what I’ve always done and work hard and make sure if I do get that opportunity I take it.”

Any concerns about Collingwood’s Test credentials were tempered by the tours of Pakistan and India in which he demonstrated the ability to construct a measured, intelligent innings in the toughest of circumstances.

These included knocks of 96 and 80 in the third Test against Pakistan in Lahore and a remarkable maiden Test century against India in Nagpur, which got England out of real trouble.

“I couldn’t have wished for it to go any better, to be honest,” he said.

“As everybody knows, I wanted to play Test cricket - and if people had said I would’ve played five Test matches this winter I obviously would’ve taken that.

“But the way they went, I was obviously delighted with the contributions I made.

“To get the first hundred was a big thing. But that first score in Lahore was the ultimate thing, to get over that hurdle of saying ‘Right, I can do it at this level’.”

Collingwood doubted whether he would “get over that hurdle” when he was left out of the second Test against Pakistan, following a poor first-Test performance in which he made scores of 10 and three.

It looked as if his stop-start Test career - he disappointed when handed his first chance on the tour of Sri Lanka in 2003 - had once again ground to a halt.

“After that first Test match in Multan, I got dropped for Faisalabad,” he said.

“When you’ve been waiting for so long and then you get that chance and didn’t take it in that first Test, that’s when I was really upset with myself.

“That’s when I really thought ‘is it going to happen?’.

“I started to doubt myself whether I was good enough for that level.

“That’s why it was so important to get over that hurdle, because I knew it just took one start and for me to put on a decent score.

“I nearly got three figures (in Lahore). But to get two scores in that game helped my confidence, and from then on I knew I could do it at that level. I knew I wouldn’t be far away.”

He may still be taking nothing for granted, but it seems the nearly man of England’s Test side is preparing to take centre-stage this summer.