Hameed's star will shine soon enough

HE may have missed out in Chittagong, but there will be a warm glow of satisfaction spreading from Bolton to Manchester when Haseeb Hameed finally becomes England’s first teenage cricketer since Ben Hollioake strode onto the international stage to tackle Australia back in 1997.

- Richard Edwards

Before Hollioake’s England bow you have to go back to 1949 to find a time when the national side last trusted someone yet to turn 20 in the form of Brian Close.

Close and Hollioake, who died tragically in a car crash at the age of just 24 in 2002, would go on to make 24 Test appearances between them.

Speak to the man who nurtured Hameed’s talent throughout his time at Bolton School, though, and you get the sense that there would be widespread surprise if Hameed didn’t comfortably surpass that figure.

“You always knew he was a special talent, but you can never say if a player was going to make it as a professional cricketer, let alone play for England,” Andy Compton, head of cricket at Bolton, tells The Cricket Paper.

“Haseeb certainly couldn’t have done any more to achieve that goal though. If he didn’t make that step-up then you had to start seriously questioning who could.”

Compton oversaw one of the school’s most successful year groups, with the Lancashire opener playing in the same team as Leicester new boy Callum Parkinson and his twin brother, Lancashire spinner, Matt.