Wicketkeeper-batsman or batsman-wicketkeeper? It is one of modern cricket’s great wrangles. “I think we stereotype keepers a bit too much,” says Ben Foakes, bashful and broad-grinned, carrying the air of a man who knows he is at the heart of a debate.

“Take Jonny [Bairstow]. People say he’s an amazing bat but you sacrifice a bit with the keeping – but he’s still a very good keeper. Or James Foster, everyone knows he’s a brilliant keeper but then you hear, ‘He’s not a good enough batter’, but he’s still a bloody good batsman and is still making tons. I’ve definitely been in that category, with people saying my keeping was good but my batting wasn’t … The aim is to be respected in both facets, to be a pure all-rounder.”

Foakes’s achievements for Surrey and England Lions this year have been remarkable: going into Saturday’s London One-Day Cup final against Nottinghamshire, he has six fifties in seven innings from No5, 481 runs at an average of 120 and a strike rate of 105; last week, against a red ball, he made an unbeaten 127 as the Lions thrashed South Africa A; and he took a Lions record 10 dismissals (as well as hitting 54 with the bat) in searing heat in Dambulla in February to cap a superb winter.

“An artist’s performance with the gloves,” was Andy Flower’s assessment. Weeks later, his director of cricket at Surrey, Alec Stewart, was calling him the world’s best wicketkeeper.

In this debate, though, Foakes’s dexterity makes him a curious case. He is a wicketkeeper into whose gloves the ball quietly kisses and, particularly down the legside, every take looks destined for a highlights reel. He believes he has become the keeper he is through work with Stewart and Bruce French, but also because he bravely joined a Surrey side who had, at times, housed five glovemen in the Championship XI. Once settled, his development has been accelerated by regularly keeping to two spinners, as well as wild pacemen in Stuart Meaker and Mark Footitt.

“At Essex I was told I wouldn’t keep as long as [James] Foster was around and fair enough. Surrey didn’t promise anything but a chance is better than no chance,” he says.

Last winter Steven Davies and Gary Wilson moved on, such is Foakes’s standing. For a 24-year-old with 70 first-class games, and who was called up to the Lions after only five, Foakes’s path has not been straightforward.“Having such good players breathing down your neck, that spurs you on,” he says. “You have to be doing everything right. You can’t coast or slip into bad habits … I’m a better keeper now than I was when I arrived. If I was playing first team at Essex I wouldn’t do any keeping, then on the winters with the Lions I’d do a lot and improve, then just drop back again. That was frustrating. I couldn’t consistently improve and I didn’t understand keeping. I do now.”

And yet, by nature, Foakes does not bat much like the modern keeper. He is orthodox and classical, not dashing and maverick, and admits he struggles with the demands of pacing an innings and shepherding the tail from No7, where he would likely bat if a Test spot were to emerge. “I like to bat as high as I can,” he says, “but at least at No6 you feel like a batsman.”

He has been freed by batting No5 in white-ball cricket – “my strength is building an innings, and that gives me time to do so, rather than arriving in the 47th over” – and this winter opened his game up by working harder in the gym [with which “I’ve always had a funny relationship”] and “tinkering with my technique, so I’m not so leg-side dominant”. He adds: “It may happen one day, but I’m not one of those guys who comes in and reverse ramps his first ball for six. I play pretty orthodox cricket, and try to get a run every ball.”

Batting with Kumar Sangakkara, with whom he shared 180 and 73 in the knockout games, has been revelatory.

“There’s been different situations where I’ve thought about doing things one way, then mentioned that to him, saying: ‘Shall I take it on now?’ And he just looks back at me like I’m the dumbest bloke in the world. As a young batsman that’s so easy to do, get to 37 overs and think you have to hit out. He’s made me realise how much time there is.”

Surrey have contrived to make a horlicks of the past two Lord’s finals. With Foakes overlooked they failed to chase 221 (having been 143 for two) against Gloucestershire in 2015, and were skittled for 136 – with Foakes making a duck – by Warwickshire last year. It is the perfect stage for him to show quite how complete his game has become.