India v England: world-beater Matt Prior should be promoted to No6 After the captain, Prior is the first name on the England teamsheet. This is not just because he is the wicketkeeper and on-field motivator but also due to his growing reliability with the bat. Including the South African series last summer and the first Test against India his recent scores have been 60, 48, 60, 7, 27, 73, 48, 91. Just one failure in eight innings against two excellent attacks. The tougher the opposition, the better he bats. But Prior has always been a batsman first and keeper second. Ever since, as a precocious 21 year-old, he thumped a decent ball in an exhibition match over long off to get off the mark, he was highlighted as someone with special talent. Now that talent is truly flourishing. He is so consistent he brings a vivid reassurance to the dressing room. They are fortified by his presence in the middle - robust, assured, bristling with intent. But with nimble footwork Prior plays back to balls that almost everyone else would go forward to. Nervelessly he did so to the last over of the fourth day from Pragyan Ojha - one it was crucial he survived - calmly stroking each jumping, spinning delivery to safety. This back-foot method allows him to ride the bounce and turn and play the ball as late as possible and cut something only fractionally short. It forces spinners to over-pitch in an effort to make him come forward, and then he steps out to drive. His real asset is an ability to hit the ball in unusual places. A quick glance at any Prior wagon wheel of scoring strokes will reveal his strength square of the wicket on the offside, using a variety of bat angles to carve, slice and smear the ball wide of cover point. But he has developed an excellent leg-side game too, with clips and sweeps through midwicket. He scores at a furious rate too, counterattacking if the position is dicey, often turning the tables on a bowling attack in the space of 10 overs. In that sense he is the closest thing England have ever had to Adam Gilchrist, without possessing quite the same audacity. His Test average (43) is better than Alec Stewart's (39.5), although Stewart usually batted in the top three and against some of the most fearsome fast bowlers in history. The question is where now for Prior? His second innings in Ahmedabad signalled a change of tempo. Partly because of the situation he seemed to have set himself for the long haul. He was more defensive than usual. His scoring rate was actually slower than Alastair Cook. Was this a sign that he is evolving into a complete batsman, one who wants to make big hundreds rather than sparky 60s? A fitness fanatic, who spends inordinate amounts of time leaping about with weights attached to his body, playing longer, more intense innings will make even greater demands on his stamina. But he is ready. Now is the right time for him to move up permanently to No6. As the linchpin of the batting order he would have more opportunity to boss situations from there, especially on a pitch in Mumbai which yielded more than 1,000 combined first-innings runs in a Ranji Trophy match last month. And if he delivered on the potential he undoubtedly has, then they could call him the Big Chief.