DON'T bother buying Martin van Jaarsveld a bat mallet for his birthday - his blade seems pretty well knocked-in as it is.

The former South African Test player enjoyed the most stunning form of his three-month Kent career, and possibly his life, when he followed his unbeaten 262 in the championship in Cardiff with a maiden league century at Bath.

Yet success for the right-hander from the High Veldt is no coincidence and is little more than his tremendous work ethic and powers of concentration deserve.

When Kent wrapped up their controversial win over Gloucestershire in Maidstone many of Kent’s squad sidled away for a celebratory drink or early dinner with the family, but van Jaarsveld was having none of it.

The Mote groundstaff were asked to put out the centre nets enabling him to receive throw downs from his ex-Test coach Graham Ford.

When Ford’s arm was thrown out Simon Willis took over for another half-hour stretch until van Jaarsveld felt comfortable with his timing.

He reaped the rewards of his dedication with a career-best and a hugely satisfying limited overs ton in front of his former Test skipper Graeme Smith.

"All season I’ve felt I’ve hit the ball well, even though I had the pair at Trent Bridge and first-baller in our next match, I’ve never really felt that I wasn’t in form," said van Jaarsveld after his heroics at the Bath Recreation Ground.

"The big danger for me is the first 15 overs of an innings, but if I can get through that then I back myself to score well and bat through.

"I take a lot of confidence when I feel I’m hitting the ball well and I’m one of those players who needs to hit a lot of balls to stay in the groove, that’s why you’ll see me net a lot.

"It takes a bit out of the coaches arm, but that’s always been my philosophy because that way they’ll be no doubts in my mind once I step over the rope to bat for real."

Though his Cardiff innings improved his career-best van Jaarsveld believes he has played better, but he also concedes that the century against Smith’s Somerset gave him a real buzz.

"I like the responsibility to go on and bat as big as possible," added van Jaarsveld, whose three career double centuries have all been unbeaten.

"At Cardiff quite a few of the guys felt they’d missed out which in turn put us under a bit of pressure because we felt we needed to bat once, and bat big, in an effort to force Glamorgan to follow-on.

"We were seven down after the first day with about 350 on the board, which I felt was a little under par, so I used that to push myself on for more runs on day two when Min and Martin backed me up tremendously.

"No disrespect to Glamorgan, but they had several bowlers out and it was a flat pitch so once I got in I tried not to take too many risks.

"You will notice I hardly ever go the aerial route but prefer to play the patience game and wait for the bad ball to put away.

"As for Bath, I got off to a flyer and went on from there and it was nice to get three-figures in front of Smithy.

"Regardless of what’s gone on in the past with my Test career he’s done so much in the game at such a young age that you can’t help but respect the guy, so it was special to do well against him."