Tom Prest hopes Under-19 World Cup lays the platform for full England honours

Tom Prest has a professional cricket contract, a triple hundred to his name and this week he will captain his country in a World Cup. Tom Prest is not 19 years old until March.

The Hampshire academy graduate, who shot to the attention of a certain set of county cricket badgers with his mammoth triple hundred in the Second XI Championship in May, will lead a 15-strong group of bright young things in the Caribbean as they look to lay down a marker for England’s next generation.

Some are not yet out of school - Prest himself only sat his A-Levels last summer - but for a few weeks on the islands of St Kitts, Trinidad and Antigua, they will don the same kit as their heroes, and play for a global ICC title.

“It’s a very proud moment to be named captain of a World Cup side. It’s not something many people can say they’ve done,” Prest tells The Cricketer. 

“It’s a great opportunity for us to show what we can do on a global platform. A lot of the games will be televised and it’s a chance for us to showcase what we can do as a side and individually. It’s the first exposure we’ve got of this sort of situation.

Prest is a gently spoken, thoughtful teenager. His media approach might not be well refined - realistically, who can expect that of a geography student on what amounts to a particular high-achieving gap year - but he is still engaging. 

He speaks well about the make-up of his England squad - “we’ve got a lot of bases covered” - and the importance of self-belief, conviction and togetherness. 

Under-19 World Cups are often the last chance for the cream of age-group crops to feel like big fish in small ponds. Upon their return, the ocean of professionalism awaits.

So this tournament represents something of a last hurrah for this Young Lions intake, many of whom have grown up together - playing with or against one another at Bunbury Festivals and Super Fours events, training with and challenging each other to improve at training camp after training camp through English cricket’s pathways.

There is little wonder, then, that the atmosphere on St Kitts is both excitable and trepidatious.

^{Prest made his Hants debut in the Blast in June (Tom Marshall/Getty Images)}

“There’s a lot of excitement,” Prest says. He is speaking to The Cricketer on the day of the tournament’s opening fixture between West Indies and Australia, and the England squad has been watching the buildup on TV. 

“It’s a great learning experience, all of it - not only playing against the best players in your age group from all over the world but also having media exposure. It’s only going to help us in the future when we kick on to play more first-team cricket and hopefully, one day go on to play for England.

“It’s a good group to be captain of, they know their roles and have quite a lot of first-team experience.”

Prest is one of the better-known players in this squad, thanks in the main to that remarkable 303 against Sussex on the Ageas Bowl Nursery Ground in late spring.

Compiled over two days - the first of which he had begun writing an essay on water pollution - and from just shy of nine hours at the crease, it was the first treble in Hampshire’s Second XI Championship history.

A first-team debut soon followed - in the T20 Blast at Taunton in June - and soon after, a first-class bow. 

“It’s probably the first time I’ve had that exposure, there was a lot of talk about it [the triple-century] on social media. I felt that there was a little bit of added pressure when I took the step up into the first team because I felt people had heard of me. It’s something you have to try to enjoy when you’re going through it.”

While runs in the senior side were somewhat harder to come by than in the second string - Prest’s top score across formats from 15 innings in 2021 was an unbeaten 59 - it did not stop Hampshire from rewarding him with a senior contract.

Batting coach Jimmy Adams described his young charge’s future as “bright”.

“What I find about Tom is that he’s grounded,” he said. “He seems to understand the game – the challenges it presents, the importance of team environment, [he is] a quiet leader. He has incredible hands through the ball.”

Adams’ remarks about Prest’s hand speed make even more sense in the context of his sporting background. 

He grew up idolising Kevin Pietersen - “I remember watching him and thinking ‘wow, that’s amazing, I want to do that with my life’” - and played racket sports and hockey through his childhood. 

^{Seven outings in the One-Day Cup then followed later in the season (Mike Hewitt/Getty Images)}

Like Jos Buttler, Tom Banton and several other prominent English white-ball operators in recent years, that multi-sport background served him well.

“Whatever I could do, I’d play it all year,” he says.

“Even when I was in the Hampshire academy, playing hockey in the winter, not only is it good for hand-eye coordination with sweeps and reverse sweeps, I found it would keep me really fit in the winter.

“It keeps your mind fresh, so when you go into an intense cricket environment having sports you can play at a recreational level really helps.”

All this makes for a very useful player. 

“I’m hoping to lead from the front, with both bat and ball,” he says as conversation refocuses on the task at hand. “For the 19s, I’ve done better with my off-spin so I’m hoping to put together a few good performances with the bat.”

On slow pitches, Prest could preside over a three-man spin attack in St Kitts as England face Bangladesh, Canada and the UAE in their group-stage matches. 

In addition to his off-spin and the leg-spin of Rehan Ahmed - whose googlies caught the attention of keen-eyed Twitter users during the Sri Lanka tour - there are three left-arm spinners in the setup. 

Watch out in particular for Fateh Singh of Warwickshire, whose changes of pace and in-development carrom ball are referenced by Prest during our conversation. 

When it comes to seam, Sonny Baker of Somerset is perhaps the brightest spark. Baker, from Torbay in Devon, claimed 10 Royal London Cup wickets in 2021 and found his way, briefly, into the Trent Rockets squad as a replacement player in The Hundred.

There is ability with the bat, too - most notably the Yorkshire opener Will Luxton. It is a squad that Prest hopes can make an impact in the Caribbean.

^{Emulating Owais Shah's side from 1998 is the target for Prest's side (Getty Images)}

“The side has good a lot of bases covered: we’ve got a lot of quick bowling options, a lot of swing bowling options, and a lot of spin options - and in the West Indies, where the pitches are a little slower, I think that will be important,” he says. 

“Spin is going to play a big part through the middle overs and we have the bowlers to do a job for us.”

In trying to keep with the white-ball mantra instilled by Eoin Morgan and Heather Knight at the top of the national setup, England are encouraged to play fearlessly and expressively. 

And the team have received messages of support from senior members of the men’s team ahead of each of their past two series - from Morgan and Chris Jordan.

“They tell us how they like to go about their cricket and giving us the confidence that they’ve been through the same pathways,” Prest says.

England have warmed up for the World Cup with victories over the UAE and Papua New Guinea. They lost a five-match ODI series in Sri Lanka 3-2 before Christmas and finished the domestic summer with a 3-1 success over West Indies. 

Their preparations on St Kitts have been relatively relaxed - three days of hotel-room quarantine giving way to more comfort, including the use of a private beach. 

“In Sri Lanka, weren’t allowed off the sixth floor,” Prest says. “So it’s nice to have a bit more freedom.”

Over the next fortnight, we will find out if that freedom translates into success for this Young Lions group.

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