Gary Ballance has been tipped to shine for England in the West Indies

Yorkshire’s Gary Ballance has been tipped to shine for England in the West Indies by his ‘uncle’ Dave Houghton, the former Zimbabwe international.

Zimbabwe-born batsman Ballance lived with Houghton, now on the coaching staff at Middlesex, when he first came to England almost ten years ago.

Houghton was Derbyshire coach at the time, and he offered Ballance a place in their Academy and found him a local club.

Ballance, 25, has since gone from strength to strength, scoring three hundreds in his opening eight Tests for his adopted country England having debuted early last year.

Unfortunately, however, the left-hander, who bats at three for the Test team, has struggled in one-day international cricket.

He recently posted only 10, 10, 10 and 6 in four World Cup matches, leading some to question his Test place for the three-match series in the Caribbean, starting next week.

But Houghton, whose wife is the cousin of Ballance’s father and is known to Gary as ‘Uncle Dave’, said: “You can’t pick Test teams based on one-day form.