Michaels On The Money / Michael Vaughan / 23 December 2010 /

The Warwickshire batsman has had his ups and downs but he's currently in th form of his life and will be around for a whole lot longer, says Michael Vaughan.

One of the highlights of the Series, irrespective of who you support, has been the batting of Ian Bell. He's behind the likes of Mike Hussey and Alastair Cook in terms of the number of runs scored but he's looked the classiest player of the lot, effortlessly driving and cutting the Aussie bowlers all over the park.

I said even before England's second-innings at Perth that I expected Paul Collingwood to come in at five again in that match but that I thought Bell would be promoted up the order for the next Test and that now seems to be the case. It would be a good, positive move from England and one which will hopefully result in him getting a really big score rather than just another half-century, which is what has happened on several occasions when he's found himself batting with the tail.

Ian is an interesting character. His talent has never been in question but he's taken a while to really assert himself, to feel like he belongs at this level. Not everyone can be a Graeme Smith and come into international cricket in their early twenties and start smacking everyone out of the ground, fear no-one and play like they've been around for a decade.

For some players it takes a little longer to find their feet, emotionally as much as anything, and I think that's what's happened with Bell but now we're seeing the end product, a batsman with full faith in his own ability who is going after bowlers and sending the message that he believes he can score runs against anyone at any ground. Batsmen rarely play beyond 37 or 38 these days simply because of the strain that the international calendar puts on your body but I wouldn't be surprised if he remains one of England's key players for the best part of the next decade.

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