Trott injury is Bopara’s chance to showcase credentials

The 26-year-old seems certain, thanks to Jonathan Trott’s shoulder injury, to win his 11th Test cap for England against India tomorrow.

It will be two years almost to the day since his last attempt at the highest level ended in a whimper as England descended to a landslide defeat against Australia at Headingley.

He was seen then as a richly-talented batsman who had been found wanting in one of cricket’s toughest environments, at No 3 in the thick of an Ashes series at an early stage of his career.

Two years on, the shorthand characterisation is intact of an instinctive and classical strokemaker who struggles for consistency – a pigeon-hole which tallies neatly with Bopara’s reputation for forgetfulness. As such, he appears the polar opposite of the frantically attentive Trott, who made a century on debut, having replaced Bopara in 2009, to help England clinch the Ashes and went on to make the No 3 position his own until diving awkwardly during last week’s 319-run victory over India at Trent Bridge.

The hosts are therefore on the verge of history, because one more win at Edgbaston will not only clinch the npower series 3-0 but see them usurp India to become the first England team to top the International Cricket Council’s Test rankings.

Bopara will be intent not just on becoming a world-beater but proving to captain Andrew Strauss and coach Andy Flower that, if not a changed man, he is one who is modified for the better.

“It’s amazing what you can learn in two years about yourself,” he said.

“Just when you think you’ve got it cracked, you suddenly realise you haven’t and you’ve got a lot to learn.”

Bopara does not try to deny his tendency to memory lapses – kit, passports and the like have not always travelled with him when they should – but reports too he has made a key acquisition.

“I’m very forgetful, I won’t lie. But I’ve invested in an iPad, which has been helping me a lot.

“I’ve been jotting little things in that help me and my life’s certainly more organised now than it ever has been.”

Bopara is under no illusions that Trott will surely replace him again for next week’s final Test at The Oval.

But he knows, too, he can do himself, and England, a lot of good in the meantime in Birmingham. He will not fail for lack of self-belief.

“I’d love to play 10 years for England,” he said. “When everyone talks about wanting to have a ‘proper’ England career, they’re talking 10 years.

“I’d love to play 10 years of international cricket because that’s where you want to prove yourself, at the top. I back my ability, and I definitely know more about myself than I ever have – what I can and can’t do.

“I know I can score runs at the top level. I’ve done it before – there’s no reason why I can’t do it again. The first thing I needed was an opportunity, and this is it.

“There wasn’t a stage where I thought I wouldn’t get back in. I knew my opportunity would come.”

He will be ready to get his head down too, whether or not the boundaries flow.

“I know I can bat in tough conditions. I do it in county cricket, and I did it a week ago against Leicestershire (when he made 178 at Southend).

“I just got into the zone and honestly felt like I couldn’t get out.”

Bopara will almost certainly bat at No 6 – rather than the No 3 position in which Ian Bell made 159 in place of the injured Trott at Nottingham.

Eoin Morgan’s No 5 slot is therefore the only one under feasible threat from a re-attuned Bopara in the medium-term future.

“I have to put pressure on other people – there’s only one way in,” he said. I’ll bat anywhere, I don’t care. I’m not saying I can’t bat No 3. I’ve done it for my county many times; I’ve got two Test hundreds at three. It’s not like I can’t do it; it’s just it didn’t happen for me against Australia.”

Fast bowler Chris Tremlett was unable to train yesterday as he continues to suffer from the back spasms which ruled him out and led to Yorkshire’s Tim Bresnan returning to Test cricket at Trent Bridge.