ashton turner will become the third cricketer born in western australia to play for worcestershire ccc when he appears for the rapids in the vitality blast next summer.
turner, who will be 27 next month, will be following in the footsteps of paceman matt mason and wicket-keeper michael johnson from that state.
mason spent a decade as a player at New Road, taking 50 plus first class wickets during three successive seasons from 2003-2005.
he was given a joint player-bowling coach role in 2009, taking over the latter post full-time after hanging up his spikes in 2011 with 318 first class wickets to his name.
mason went onto become bowling coach at leicestershire for two seasons but has now returned to take up a similar role at western australia, for whom he made his debut in the late 1990s, and perth scorchers.
johnson, now aged 31, was back up keeper to luke ronchi at western australia but made his first class debut for them in 2009.
he had a dual passport and was recruited by worcestershire in 2013 and averaged 14.15 with the bat over 10 championship matches and was released at the end of the season.
turner will become the 28th australian born cricketer to represent worcestershire.
the list consists of 13 players from new south wales, five from south australia four from queensland, three from victoria in addition to the three from western australia.
he is available for the rapids entire blast campaign.
*thanks to andrew thomas, author of ‘pears 150’ for his assistance with this article.
