How perceptions can define careers sometimes. Andy Murray has just played the game of his life and lost. Those that can't be bothered to look under the surface will still dismiss him as a sour-faced Scot who fails when it matters most. After all, he walked off court in a sulk without waiting for the victor.

The hardest thing is to change, let alone change perception, especially when you are on public show and everyone claims to know what you are like.

Monty Panesar has also suffered from another affliction, far more blatant than the Murray one. It is a familiar caricature that brings guffaws to the commentary box as well as the stands.

Monty, you see, is the idiot savant, unable to bat, unable to catch and quite clearly someone who acts like an over eager teenager rather than a professional sportsman. In the modern world of gym bunnies and drilled regimes, his imperfections and amateur characteristics are given enormous coverage.

Perhaps the most damaging critique came from Shane Warne, who famously said that: "Monty hasn't played 33 Tests. He's played one Test 33 times." On another occasion when England played South Africa at Lord's in 2008, Warne was of the opinion that Panesar "bowled the same ball again and again for 60 overs."

It created the impression that despite a quite admirable record of over 100 wickets, there was no real thinking or strategy behind the spinner's method.

Panesar clearly had a sensational start to his international career. After a modest introduction to India in 2006, he bowled beautifully to a richly talented Pakistan batting line at home, claiming scalps like Inzamam-ul-Haq, Mohammad Yousuf and Younis Khan.

The Monty legend grew as English fans came to see him field miserably, jump like Zebedee with every scalp and even clobber Muralitharan for a six. All of this added to the stuff of nonsense that meant you couldn't really take him seriously. It was easier to laugh and say: "Good old Monty".

With the desperate Ashes tour of 2006, he rode to a mini rescue again, taking eight wickets in Perth, after being ignored by Duncan Fletcher in the first two Test matches. Never the most vocal of people or the most confident, he began to suffer over Fletcher's reliance on multi-faceted cricketers and from the general demise in spirit and results.

Warne's assertions are truthful in the sense that Panesar is more of a mechanical bowler than an instinctive one. With the introduction of the altogether more animated Graeme Swann and his box of tricks, there was a feeling that the then Nottinghamshire spinner may just slip into complete oblivion.

His move to Sussex ahead of the 2010 season reinvigorated the man within the Monty. "They've helped me grow at Sussex," he said. "They have made me play a leading role in all forms of the game and that has increased my confidence and self-belief. I've just kept going and waited for this opportunity."

During his time in Sydney playing grade cricket, he has even been singing Bruce Springsteen covers in the Mike Whitney band. Whitney is the man who dropped Ian Botham in the famous Old Trafford Test of 1981. It was the kind of skier which Panesar would probably have made a mess of as well. Three decades later, Whitney may be helping England again, unwittingly.

There is nothing wrong in seeing the 29-year-old as a man who does not fit the mould of the all-round modern sportsman. Nor is there anything wrong in warming to his infectious enthusiasm.

It is perhaps lucky for Panesar that when he dropped Mohammed Hafeez in the first innings, he managed to get him out next ball. In the middle of a defining Test series for England, the number one team in the world, the emphasis is on the serious side of winning.

This may help elevate Monty's status from the mask of mirth to the Test player who can win matches again.

Tim Ellis