Nottinghamshire sign Ashwin as replacement for James Pattinson

Ashwin will feature in six of the seven remaining games for the County side. © Getty

Ravichandran Ashwin will represent Nottinghamshire for the second half of the county season, it was confirmed on Thursday (May 23). He has been signed as a replacement for Australian fast bowler James Pattinson who is likely to be a part of Australia's Ashes squad. The Indian spinner will feature in six out of their final seven red-ball matches.

Ashwin, who has also represented Worcestershire, stressed he's eager to get started. "I'm really looking forward to joining up with Nottinghamshire, to playing cricket at an iconic venue like Trent Bridge and hopefully contributing to some County Championship victories. I enjoyed my previous stint in England with Worcestershire. It's a good, competitive standard of cricket over there and I can't wait to get started," the off-spinner said.

In his debut county season for Worcestershire, Ashwin picked up 20 wickets at an average of 29.15 and he made decent contributions with bat too, scoring 214 runs at an average of 42.80.

"We knew what we wanted to sign and that was a world-class bowler. Whether that was a fast or a slow bowler, we were prepared to look at all options," Nottinghamshire director of cricket Mick Newell said. "As it happens, we've signed a very good spinner, a very experienced spinner and one we hope can contribute with the bat as well. We've seen world-class slow bowlers have a huge match-winning effect in county cricket over many years. Ravi certainly has that potential - and we're very much looking forward to welcoming him to the squad and letting him loose on our opposition."

Ashwin will start his county season with a match at home against Essex, followed by matches against Somerset and Surrey. He will be the second Indian to feature in county cricket this season after Ajinkya Rahane who started his campaign in a stellar fashion with a hundred against Nottinghamshire.