There also seems to be plenty of debate regarding Callum Ferguson, and I think his situation is very similar to James Hildreth who plays at Somerset. Hildreth has always been earmarked as a player of great potential and one for the future England side, yet despite having the batters paradise that is Taunton as his home ground, his numbers have never stacked up. There's no great clamour to have him included right now as we have seven decent batsmen in the squad which most English fans are more than happy with.
But Hildreth is now 26, and would no longer force his way into the Test side based on potential and needs to back that up with serious results right now, and sheer weight of runs, which he produced in the domestic 2010 season with a fantastic year. In 2009 his record was decent, but he scored the majority of his runs at Taunton and needed to prove he can score runs away from home too.
He is now in the development side and will support the full Test side for the first few Tests. The point is, at 26 he really needs to produce big runs, consistenly, you'd think the time for promise has passed, but of course there's always exceptions.