Northamptonshire head coach Sadler believes Sales 'ticks every box'

The new Northamptonshire boss has watched the 18-year-old’s progress closely over the past two years when he worked as assistant to David Ripley, who stood down as head coach at the end of September.

Most of that time was spent playing in the second team by Sales, but he shot to prominence in the second half of the 2021 summer, first making his mark in the Royal London One Day Cup, and then making his first-class debut in the LV= Insurance County Championship.

Sales took the step up in class in his stride, and was quickly rewarded with the offer of a first senior professional contract, which he signed at the end of September.

The youngster could make his England Under-19 debut in their ODI series against Sri Lanka this week, and if he performs well there has a great chance of going to the Under-19 World Cup in the Caribbean in January.

And Sadler is in no doubt the former Overstone Park CC youngster has the tools to ensure he does just that.

“He is a player with great potential,” said Sadler of Sales.

“He ticks every box in that he bats, he bowls, he fields, he is a great athlete and his attitude is good.

“James is a very exciting prospect for us to work with, and he said himself when we sat down to talk to him recently that it all happened very quickly.

“He was playing in the second team and kind of scratching around with bat and ball, and he was just playing and learning and enjoying it.

“Suddenly, with a couple of good performances, he gets a couple of opportunities and ‘bang’, he is playing first-team cricket.

“He played a couple of 50-overs games and he was then playing first-class cricket a couple of weeks later and he he had some success as well.

“It just shows you in this game that things can change very quickly, but it has been great for Salesy.”

England Under-19s' first ODI against Sri Lanka is on Tuesday (Nov 30), with further matches on Friday (Dec 3), Sunday (Dec 5) and then next Wednesday (Dec 8) and Friday (Dec 10).

All the matches are scheduled to be played at the SSC Ground in Colombo.

England U19 squad: Rehan Ahmed (Leicestershire); Tom Aspinwall (Lancashire); Josh Baker (Worcestershire); Sonny Baker (Somerset); Nathan Barnwell (Surrey); George Bell (Lancashire); Jacob Bethell (Warwickshire); Josh Boyden (Lancashire); Ben Cliff (Yorkshire); James Coles (Sussex); Harry Crawshaw (Durham); Alex Horton (Glamorgan); Dan Ibrahim (Sussex); Will Luxton (Yorkshire); Tom Prest (Hampshire); James Rew (Somerset); James Sales (Northamptonshire); Fateh Singh (Nottinghamshire); George Thomas (Somerset)