Steven Finnhas a simple plan during this World Cup winter – take as many wickets as possible.
It is perhaps an understandable philosophy following a difficult 12 months that has seen the tall quick have to re-evaluate his game and fight to regain his England place.
Finn left the tour of Australia last winter early, after failing to play a competitive match, but could yet return Down Under for the World Cup in two months’ time.
The 25-year-old knows that if he is to do that he must impress during the current tour of Sri Lanka, where the absence of first-choice duo James Anderson and Stuart Broad has created opportunities for the rest of the seam attack.
“All I want to do is to try and take as many wickets and bowl as well as I possibly can out here and hopefully that will contribute towards me getting picked for the World Cup,” he told ecb.co.uk.
“All I can control is how I bowl. As long as I’m bowling well I can be content with myself that I’ve done as much as I can.”
Finn admits that he has had some low moments over the past year but, after he has steadily built towards re-selection for the squad in Sri Lanka, he is now only looking forward.
“It’s been an encouraging end to the last year,” he said.
“There were some tough times in there but everyone goes through tough times in their career. The most important thing now is that I don’t dwell on the past and I look forward to the future.
“I’ve been through it, I’ve experienced things that I wish I didn’t experience at the beginning of my career but it happens and moving forward is now the most important thing.”
For now he is hoping to try and push himself back up the pecking order after being handed the new ball for the tour-opener against Sri Lanka A in Colombo yesterday.
The right-armer claimed 2-43 in the 56-run Duckworth/Lewis Method win and, while he is the most experienced quick in the squad in terms of games played, he believes he has ground to recover on the likes of Chris Woakes, Ben Stokes and Chris Jordan.
“I haven’t played as much as the other guys over the last 12 months so I suppose I’m down the pecking order a little bit,” he said.
“It’s up to me to try and change that over here. I got given the new ball in this warm-up game and hopefully I’ll be given the new ball tomorrow in the next warm-up game and that’s really a chance for me to make a statement and make a point to be in that World Cup squad.”