The pictures show a young Joe Root before he was an England star

Joe Root has lit up the Ashes with his full range of strokes, including his new trademark reverse sweep.

These photos of a young Joe Root at school in Sheffield and his formative years on the cricket field show how he was clearly blessed with talent from an early age, long before he became the scourge of Australian bowling.

They also reveal how Joe is skilled with any type of racket, and a loss in cricket could easily have been a gain in table tennis if he had decided to pursue a career in ping pong, where he also excelled as a schoolboy.

Joe Root participated Dore elementary school and then King Ecgbert’s Schoolwhere future Olympic great Jessica Ennis was among her fellow students.

He followed in the footsteps of his father Matthew and former Yorkshire and England star Michael Vaughan by joining Abbeydale Park-based Sheffield Collegiate CC.

Joe Root was just 16 when he made his second-team debut for Yorkshire County Cricket Club on 18 July 2007, hitting 57 as part of a 133-wicket stand with Adam Lyth. Two years later, in September 2009, he made his first team bow and again seized the opportunity to score the hosts’ best goal in a Headingley defeat to Essex. He even took an excellent diving catch for Essex and England legend Alastair Cook.

He made his Test debut in 2012, hitting 73 and 20, but failed to help England to their first Test series win in India in nearly 30 years. has collected more than 11,000 test runs with an average of more than 50while also excelling in T20 and One Day cricket.