This summer will surely be the last campaign this veteran left-hander.

He will be badly missed having been England's best player almost without interruption since marking his 1993 debut with an unbeaten 114 and the man-of-the-match award against Australia at Trent Bridge.

The kind of player whose style is sufficiently understated not to attract too many headlines, he has consistently scored higher than Michael Atherton, Nasser Hussain and other more lauded contemporaries in an outstanding career.

Unwanted attention has come via the tabloid front pages and the stress of a high-profile divorce looked to have prematurely ended his international career first in 1999 and then again in 2002/3 when he controversially withdrew from the Ashes after initially promising start to the tour.

While some feel he has let England down off the field, that accusation could certainly not be levelled at the left-hander's performances at the crease.

That peculiar brand of batsman who seems more comfortable performing a salvage job at 30-3 than creaming off easy runs at 300-3, Thorpe has saved England's skin on countless occasions under Atherton, Hussain and Michael Vaughan.

The current England skipper has been enormously grateful for the experience which has allowed the construction of a new-look batting order around the reliable Surrey player.

Thorpe used that absence from the last Ashes series to restore stability to his troubled private life and the change has been apparent on the field following an unexpectedly fast restoration to the Test side.

Having returned to the county scene in 2003 with a new resolve to maximise his final years in the game, he was recalled to face South Africa at The Oval and responded with 124.

That reminder of his quality secured a place on tours of Sri Lanka and the West Indies and, having fulfilled his obligations as a tourist, all remaining doubts evaporated.

He was excellent again in the 2004 whitewashes of New Zealand and West Indies but struggled a little in South Africa last winter.

Few put this down to a return of the touring demons - Thorpe will be 36 by the end of the 2005 Ashes and his talents must inevitably wane but talk of his demise looks one summer premature.

Having shown the determination to get this far, the competitor in Thorpe will not easily surrender one last chance at Ashes success.