Andrew Flintoff during training on the eve of the second Test against South Africa at Headingley on Thursday. (AFP)

There was a lad in the Headingley nets yesterday (Wednesday), who could turn out to be a pretty handy player. Tall, blond and burly, he bowled at a decent lick, swinging it both ways and smacking Alastair Cook hard enough on the knee to leave the batsman hobbling. Then, when he batted, he launched one ball high on to the roof of the rugby stand, dislodging a cascade of broken tiles.

The mystery man was, of course, Andrew Flintoff. Formerly BBC Sports Personality of the Year, Flintoff is one of the most recognisable sportsmen in the country. And yet he will go into tomorrow’s (Friday) second Test as something of an unknown quantity.

The captain, the players and the coaching staff are all fond of saying, “We know what Freddie can do.” But after 18 months out of Test cricket, no one — even Flintoff himself — will know what to expect when he walks out on the Headingley turf. From the perspective of Michael Vaughan, and the rest of the England team, it will be almost like having a completely new player in the side.

“If I said I had never got dispirited, over the 18 months I’ve been out, I’d be lying,” Flintoff admitted on Wednesday. “But there is a big carrot at the end of it, and that is the chance of playing for England again. Anyone who has experienced wearing an England shirt will tell you that is incentive enough. And that’s the one thing which, when I’ve been in the gym or I’ve been going running or whatever, has been in the back of my mind all the way.

“Now the key is not to put too much pressure on myself. Even playing for Lancashire, every time I turn up for the game, there’s cameras there, there’s television, there’s all the press. And whether I get fifty or get out first ball, I seem to grab the headline. It’s something I’m not going to take too much notice of. If I want to play with freedom, I can’t be worried about what people are writing or saying. I’ve just got to get on with my own game.”

Everyone has their own opinion about which Andrew Flintoff they expect to see when the players take the field.

The optimists are banking on the 2005 model, a ferocious fast bowler and equally intimidating batsman, capable of scattering any opposition to the four winds. The pessimists, meanwhile, have yet to be convinced if the great man is fully fit and firing. They keep muttering about the Flintoff of 2006-07, a man out of sorts with his body and his game, trying desperately to fight through the pain from his left ankle.

Such concerns will never fully recede, not after the four operations that have been carried out on that recalcitrant joint. But all the indications are that Flintoff feels more comfortable bowling now than he has for four or five years. Judging from his whole-hearted efforts at Wednesday’s nets, there was certainly no sense that he is saving himself for match-day.