SJS
Hall of Fame Member
Boycott talks eminent sense as usual.
Its much more fun hearing Boycott
Question : ...a lot is being said about Ian Bell showing great potential and form in the nets but being unable to carry it to the field. As far as your memory serves, who are the three most notable failed talents you can recall - people you thought had great potential but for some reason or the other couldn't fulfill it? And for such situations, is there a role that selectors and team management can play to help such players?
Boycott : Yes, there have been some players like that. The most notable one in recent times is Mark Ramprakash for England. I was the judge in a big one-day competition in England and I chose him as Man of the Match for making 50 in a low-scoring game when he was 19. I actually saw him make his first first-class hundred against my county, Yorkshire. But he never managed to do it at the top level. Mark has played 52 Tests; he looks immaculate and is technically correct, but he got only two hundreds at an average of 27.33. That's not really good - you are not going to win Tests with an average of 27.
Today in the England side you have people like Monty Panesar, who has played 30-odd Tests. But Shane Warne says that he has played one Test 30-odd times because he hasn't changed his bowling; he hasn't learnt a lot from his first Test.
Steve Harmison, at 6 feet 5 inches, has got pace and bounce, but except for one fleeting moment when he was ranked the No. 1 Test bowler in the world after his performance in the West Indies [in 2004], he has been quite disappointing. Everybody will remember his first ball in an Ashes game in Brisbane [2006] that he bowled wide of second slip.
Another guy has been Bill Athey, who played for Yorkshire - I played a little bit with him before I finished. He played 23 Tests for England and was technically correct but managed only one hundred at an average of 22.9.
The key to it is the demons in their head. All these batsmen have been technically correct batsmen, but it just shows that batting is a bit more than technique. A great deal of it is played in the mind. And this is the point that I always try to make: when you are watching young players, you can see their talent and their technique, but you really cannot see their character or what is there in their head until they are put in situations where their temperament is tested. That you can only see over a period of time.
Is there anything that the selectors or the team management can do to help them? Well, you can talk to them and try and help them, but in the end, once you are batting, you are on your own. It is a thinking game; you have got use your brain. It is like playing chess with people. The bowler tries to move you around by testing you out and bowling different things. You have got to be up to it and have a quick mind to work it out, and if you can't, you have a problem.
Boycott : Yes, there have been some players like that. The most notable one in recent times is Mark Ramprakash for England. I was the judge in a big one-day competition in England and I chose him as Man of the Match for making 50 in a low-scoring game when he was 19. I actually saw him make his first first-class hundred against my county, Yorkshire. But he never managed to do it at the top level. Mark has played 52 Tests; he looks immaculate and is technically correct, but he got only two hundreds at an average of 27.33. That's not really good - you are not going to win Tests with an average of 27.
Today in the England side you have people like Monty Panesar, who has played 30-odd Tests. But Shane Warne says that he has played one Test 30-odd times because he hasn't changed his bowling; he hasn't learnt a lot from his first Test.
Steve Harmison, at 6 feet 5 inches, has got pace and bounce, but except for one fleeting moment when he was ranked the No. 1 Test bowler in the world after his performance in the West Indies [in 2004], he has been quite disappointing. Everybody will remember his first ball in an Ashes game in Brisbane [2006] that he bowled wide of second slip.
Another guy has been Bill Athey, who played for Yorkshire - I played a little bit with him before I finished. He played 23 Tests for England and was technically correct but managed only one hundred at an average of 22.9.
The key to it is the demons in their head. All these batsmen have been technically correct batsmen, but it just shows that batting is a bit more than technique. A great deal of it is played in the mind. And this is the point that I always try to make: when you are watching young players, you can see their talent and their technique, but you really cannot see their character or what is there in their head until they are put in situations where their temperament is tested. That you can only see over a period of time.
Is there anything that the selectors or the team management can do to help them? Well, you can talk to them and try and help them, but in the end, once you are batting, you are on your own. It is a thinking game; you have got use your brain. It is like playing chess with people. The bowler tries to move you around by testing you out and bowling different things. You have got to be up to it and have a quick mind to work it out, and if you can't, you have a problem.
Its much more fun hearing Boycott
He hardly gets a gig outside of the Riverside or when he does it has to be overcast and the wicket turgid. His nothing more then a Mickey Mouse county bowler who has found a niche for himself like Jeremy Snape once did. 
Love that match. Should have had GI Joe's accompanying laughter track IMO.