England star credits Ottis Gibson with helping him improve while playing down hopes of an Ashes comeback

The Durham seamer faces stiff competition for a place in a side that has now won 10 of its last 12 Tests under his county colleague Ben Stokes and head coach Brendon McCullum, and Potts did not play in the winter Tests following Ollie Robinson’s return to fitness.

However, if he does feature in the forthcoming series against Australia, Potts may look back with even greater fondness and gratitude for time spent working with Gibson last summer at the Headingley-based Northern Superchargers, where the West Indian was head coach James Foster’s assistant.

Speaking at a promotional event for The Hundred at Edgbaston, Potts told The Yorkshire Post: “It was a great experience working with Ottis. I had some really good chats with him.

“Obviously he played for Durham as well, so we kind of had something in common there, and he was a pleasure to work with during the tournament.

“I’ve had the pleasure of working with some very highly regarded bowling coaches in recent times, such as Ottis and Neil Killeen, and I felt as though I got a lot out of working with Ottis from a confidence point of view and from a skill point of view. At the end of the day, he’s a top-quality coach and when you work alongside someone like that it’s hard not to improve.”

Gibson, 54, will not be with Superchargers this year as he wants to concentrate on his Yorkshire role. He felt that he learned plenty himself from last year’s competition, just as Potts relished the chance to tap into Gibson’s knowledge.

“Ottis’s thoughts around bowling and how we weren’t necessarily holding our lengths for long enough was really valuable,” said Potts.

“We started to get funky with slower balls a little bit too early, things like that, when actually the good length ball, back-of-a-length, hard into the pitch at pace is quite hard to hit.

“Trying to move the new ball early is important because in T20 cricket and The Hundred, getting wickets at the top, at the start, is something that obviously helps stem the run-flow.

“So that’s something we looked towards and talked about - the ability to take wickets at the start, and Ottis helped improve that as well.”

Potts, who has started the season well with Durham, taking six wickets on his last County Championship appearance against Worcestershire, is looking forward to seeing Gibson when Yorkshire visit Chester-le-Street in the tournament next month. It has the air of a big game between sides strongly fancied to do well this season.

“When Ottis comes we’ll have a sit down, no doubt, we’ll have a catch-up and see how things are going,” said Potts. “Ottis is a great fellow and an even better bowling coach, so it’s always nice to see him and catch-up.”

Further good displays in the weeks and games ahead will keep Potts at the forefront of the selectors’ thoughts ahead of the Ashes. The series schedule could work in his favour - five Tests in less than seven weeks, which explains why Stokes wants “eight fit fast bowlers” - but Potts is keeping his feet on the ground.

“Obviously the Ashes is coming around and there will be a lot of speculation leading up to it, but I’m not concerning myself too much with that,” said a man who was earlier this month named one of Wisden’s Five Cricketers of the Year.

“It will be the same approach that I had last summer before getting selected.

“I’m just going to try and take care of business for Durham, first and foremost, because sometimes you can get too far ahead looking at goals where you want to get to. I know that if I put the performances in that I’m capable of for Durham, that whatever will be will be, essentially.”

No sooner does the Ashes series finish than The Hundred starts, with Superchargers’ first match against Birmingham Phoenix at Headingley on August 3.

Superchargers have had an underwhelming couple of years in the fledgling tournament, finishing fifth and then sixth, but Potts is confident of better this year.

“I think we’ve pieced together good squads in the last couple of years but probably haven’t got the results we necessarily wanted,” he said. “This year, I think we’ve built on the squad with a couple of core players sticking around, so we’ll hopefully have a good chance of finishing in the top part of the table.

“Two bottom-half finishes is not the best, not what we wanted, and not what the fans wanted, certainly. We’ll be trying very hard to improve on that this year.”