You may know who Chris Rogers is. You may even be part of an extremely select group of people who can pick him out of a line of ginger cricketers. The other night you could have seen him strong-arming Leicester wearing the worst one-day kit in English domestic cricket. Most people don’t know who he is, and unfortunately for him, that may just be his lot in life. Rogers is part of the great Australian batting pool.

Rogers has been quietly accumulating first class runs on two continents for years now. He is either the next Marcus North/Mike Hussey or the next Martin Love/Jamie Cox.

If he is the next North/Hussey life will be all beer, skittles and receiving phone numbers of people he has seen on the telly. If he turns out as a Love/Cox his family and friends will talk about how good he is but he won’t get much of a mention in Wisden upon his passing.

When it comes to batsmen, Australia always has an amazing surplus. There are very few stories of great Australian bowlers who haven’t played enough in the modern era.

Batting is the opposite. Ever since the middle order became a Waugh and Border show breaking into the Australian batting line has been tough. Stuart Law and Jamie Siddons tormented Shield cricket bowlers for a decade and played one Test between them.

Martin Love was as organised a batsman as you can find. His innings were penciled into his calendar well before he filed them on match day. He received five Tests for 16,000 first class runs at 49, and those five Tests were all as an understudy.

Jamie Cox is not a household name, but he had a technique as tight as whatever racially frugal stereotype you’d like to use. He has second most runs in Sheffield Shield history. If he stood next to 99.99% of Australian cricket fans at the supermarket they wouldn’t know whom he was. They wouldn’t even say, “this guy looks familiar”, even though he played more Shield games than any other player ever.

Rogers is quickly following in the tradition of these fine men. He is a terrific batsman (Victoria, Western Australia, Derbyshire, Northamptonshire, and Leicestershire will agree) but probably not the most eye-catching.

Love and Cox had the same affliction, plenty of runs, but very few people ever talked them up with panting breath or an excited voice. Rogers was hardly more than whispered for the opening position when Hayden retired. When Australia needed a back up opener in England there was no call made to him, instead Watson was promoted.

Rogers is now 32, still ginger, has one Test due to a Hayden injury, a first class batting average of over 50 (seven more than M North) and a stunning record in two countries. However, unless a miracle happens in the next two years he will only play one Test match for Australia.

It doesn’t seem fair. Nathan Hauritz has played seven Tests and his first class bowling average is 45.

Jrod is an Australian blogger, and now author. His book The Year Of The Balls 2008: A Disrespective is available now