Bell aiming for maturity

Ian Bell is keen to shake off his tag as a "good young player"

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Ian Bell is hoping to return home from New Zealand next month having made major strides towards changing perceptions of his status on the international stage.

The Warwickshire batsman has been labelled as a promising youngster from the moment he made his Test and one-day international debuts back in 2004 as a fresh-faced 22-year-old.

But Bell, who has now played 33 Tests and 62 one-day internationals, is desperate to make the transition away from being regarded as a talented youngster into the type of player who demands instant respect from international opposition.

"If you look at any of the best players in the world there's a maturity level that goes with them," explained Bell. "There's something about them, the way they practise, the way they are as people, I think that's something I'm trying to move towards.

"It's not just about when you're in the nets and how you practise, there's a whole maturity thing that goes around them when they're in the dressing room - it's the way they control their own game, they don't rely on anyone else to be their batting coach for them.

"If you look at Ricky Ponting, he controls everything himself about his own game and that's something I'm trying to do.

"He's a strong individual and that's something I'm searching for personally - to become that mature person that people look at in a different light so they don't look at me as a good young player but look at me as a really tough cricketer."

Bell's desire to become a major figure in international cricket follows a conversation with Andy Flower, England's assistant coach, who told him he has the talent to become one of the best players in the world - but must start acting like it if he is to achieve such a level.

It has prompted him to play a greater role inside the dressing room, offering opinions and suggestions which has impressed coach Peter Moores to such an extent that he put forward Bell's name as a possible successor to Paul Collingwood as captain in the future.

Andy Flower has helped Bell focus mentally © Getty Images

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"Certainly when we get into the team meetings and chat I try to make as big a contribution as possible because I am one of the senior players now in the one-day side," said Bell.

"The onus is also on me batting at number three to get big scores and get us off to good starts.

"When Andy was talking about that, it's not only how other people see me but also how I see myself.

"That's one thing that Peter Moores and Andy are quite keen for me to not see myself as a young player any more, but to see myself as a more experienced player in the team and a proper Test cricketer."

Bell went some way towards aiding his progress towards that sort of status with a key role in Friday's revival win over New Zealand, when he scored an important 73 to help the tourists claim a six-wicket triumph having lost the opening two one-day internationals.

It followed a run of 12 one-day internationals without a half-century and Bell conceded: "It was nice to make an impact on us winning a game, certainly on this tour.

"I feel as if I've been hitting the ball well, but I just haven't been getting the scores and it was nice to make an impact on the game and hopefully give us the momentum to go to Napier and level the series.

"There's been a lot of honest chat in the dressing room. People have opened up and talked honestly and I think that needed to happen because the last two performances weren't good enough.

"After the kind of one-day cricket we've played in the last two series it was a bit of a kick up the backside and showed we're nowhere near where we want to get to if we want to be beating Australia.

"I think it's healthy that we've talked like that. We could easily have walked away and said they were just two games of cricket and moved on, but the best teams in the world would sit down and talk honestly about what was going wrong and what we can do to improve it."