Bairstow provides some golden memories to treasure

The 21-year-old has been one of the biggest success stories of the past few months and provided rich entertainment with the bat and the gloves.

Bairstow is one of those can’t-take-your-eyes-off-them type of cricketers, the sort who can empty bars of admiring spectators just as easily as he can send bowlers rushing to bars to drown their sorrows.

Time spent watching Bairstow is never spent in vain, for he possesses that intangible quality known as “X-factor”.

What a season it has been for the blossoming Bairstow: a maiden first-class century (205) against Nottinghamshire at Trent Bridge, a maiden one-day hundred (114) against Middlesex at Lord’s, and some near-faultless performances behind the stumps.

He was the only Yorkshire player to top 1,000 Championship runs – despite missing three of the 16 games through international commitments.

Throw in a century for England Lions at Scarborough and a call-up to the full England squad for last month’s one-day international against Ireland, and it has been a special year on a personal level.

“I’ve really enjoyed it,” said Bairstow. “To finish with 1,000 runs was very pleasing, and obviously it was great to score a hundred for the Lions and be part of the squad that went to Ireland.

“Going into the year, I hadn’t had a hundred in either form of the game, so to finish with a hundred in both Championship and one-day cricket was very satisfying.

“It’s been a learning curve for all of us at Yorkshire, but I think there were some very good individual performances from the boys – Gary Ballance and Joe Root played out of their skins, while Ryan Sidebotom was magnificent – and that’s something we can definitely take into next year.”

Bairstow is quick to pay tribute to his colleagues, but it is his own displays which have really caught the eye.

Some of his stroke-play was incredible to behold, the product of a clearly exceptional talent.

“It’s something I try to work on in practice, but I don’t try and get too far ahead of myself,” he added.

“If the ball is there to be hit, I try to hit it, but I don’t like to over-complicate things.

“I just see the ball and try to react to it. I think the more things you complicate, the harder it becomes because there’s more things that can go wrong.”

Although he has had a splendid season, Bairstow is keeping his feet on the ground. “There are still a lot of improvements to be made and I need to keep working hard. Hopefully, I can improve my batting through the experience of playing in different situations on different pitches in different countries.

“I also need to keep working hard on my keeping. People say keepers only get noticed when they’re making mistakes, so hopefully I’ll keep not getting noticed.”

Bairstow is the not the sort of cricketer to go unobserved. This year, whether batting or keeping, he has kept us all on the edge of our seats and given us memories to treasure and relish.