In recent years, the Professional Cricketers’ Association (PCA) has worked with first-class counties to establish guidelines around the high-risk, low-paid work environment faced by second XI investigators.

Before 2021, clubs were not required to pay testers when they turned up.

Previously, the opportunity and hope that came from a match at that level were considered enough.

An element of that still exists, as players are not paid for the first five days of a trial, ensuring that you don’t have to budget for every opportunity you have to scout for new talent.

Rich Hudson, PCA director of cricket operations, described second XI cricket as a “melting pot of different people, dynamics and tensions”.

“You’ve got the pro trying to regain his form or come back from an injury, and you’ve got the youngster in the academy who’s desperately trying to prove he’s worth a contract and learn his way, and then you’ve got the Sheridon-type player who’s fighting for his life to get another contract and prove himself,” Hudson said.

“We also understand the financial pressures of the game, which means decision makers constantly have to make decisions that carry a natural tension between doing the right thing to support people in that environment and high performance success, where the first team must perform in the Championship and T20 Blast.”

And with the support of Leicestershire, Gumbs says he is once again dreaming of what he can offer as a cricketer.

“Making my Blast debut and being in and around the boys, training in that kind of T20 environment, I 100% believe there will be a boost with my white-ball cricket and I want to see how far I go with that,” he added.

“With the red ball I want to show off the England shield again.

“My brother always told me: ‘You’re never that far away,’ but I always thought about the other side and almost thought: I’m miles away.

“This contract, and everything that comes with it, is big and Leicestershire have given me that kind of belief that maybe I’m not that far away at all.”