England includes Vince as cover for injured keeper Jonny Bairstow

Vince was on Thursday named in an enlarged 14-man squad for next week’s fourth Test in Southampton and will provide cover for the injured Jonny Bairstow.

Bairstow fractured a finger while keeping wickets during England’s humbling 203-run defeat by India at Trent Bridge but it is hoped he will be fit enough to play as a specialist batsman at the Ageas Bowl.

If not, then Vince will be brought back for his third spell as a Test player after being dropped following a chastening winter when England failed to win any of its seven Tests in Australia and New Zealand.

To be fair to Vince, he did score 70 in his last Test innings in Christchurch before new national selector Ed Smith dropped him at the start of the season to make room for Jos Buttler in the middle order.

Smith told Vince that the door was not closed and if he scored big runs for Hampshire he would be considered again and now the selectors have been true to their word by naming him in an enlarged 14-man squad.

The Hampshire captain has always looked like he had the game for the highest level but has yet to do justice to his talents and averages just under 25 from his 13 Tests. He has also got out repeatedly outside off-stump but now brings the advantage of being a right-hander at a time when England’s left-handed batsmen in particular are struggling against Ishant Sharma and Ravichandran Ashwin.

“The selection panel felt this was the right time to reintroduce James Vince to the squad and he will provide cover in case Jonny Bairstow’s fractured finger stops him playing,” said Smith.

James returns to the set-up in confident form and has been scoring runs. He has been excellent for Hampshire in the championship and his match-winning runs also helped Hampshire win the Royal London Cup earlier this summer.

Vince has scored 847 runs at 56.46 for Hampshire this season and made a timely 74 and 147 in this week’s win against Notts and will play on his home ground next week if Bairstow fails a fitness test.

In any case, Bairstow will definitely not be fit to keep wicket so the gloves will revert back to white-ball gloveman Buttler who took over from the Yorkshireman behind the stumps after he was hurt at Trent Bridge.

England have kept faith with under-pressure openers Keaton Jennings and Alastair Cook but clearly they will need runs at the Ageas Bowl or the final Test in the summer if they are to secure their places on tour in Sri Lanka this winter. The only man to miss out is Jamie Porter who has been part of the last three squads without playing. 

Joe Root (Captain), Moeen Ali, Alastair Cook, James Anderson, Jonny Bairstow (WK), Stuart Broad, Jos Buttler (WK), Sam Curran, Keaton Jennings, Ollie Pope, Asil Rashid, Ben Stokes, James Vince and Chris Woakes.