Younis Khan to sign for Surrey

Something of a bolt from the blue, but it would appear it has been confirmed this morning that former Pakistan captain and alleged trouble maker Younis Khan has signed for Surrey and subject to visas may well be in place for Surrey's CB40 game with Lancashire at Old Trafford on the 23rd of May.

Suddenly his fallout with the Pakistani authorities is looking like a very handy thing indeed! Younis has played for Notts and Yorkshire before so has plenty of experience of England, and it hardly needs saying that he is a class act at this level.

5,200 test match runs at an average north of 50, 16 hundreds including a mammoth triple against Sri Lanka early last year mark him out as world class. He's also added the small measure of 5,600 ODI runs to boot.

According to Jason Cobb, faithful attendee at a members meeting this morning Younis was originally signed for the Twenty20 Cup (on the face of it an odd choice, but remember he did skipper - impressively - Pakistan to the World T20 title last year and was a source of good runs for their middle order), but has been persuaded to open the batting for Surrey in the County Championship. What an opportunity for young Harinath to have a modern master alongside him opening the batting, a fantastic proposition.

The initiative shown in addressing the overseas issue in the (presumed permanent) absence of Piyush Chawla by altering the signing of Younis to a long term one is welcome so credit to Adams and Mackay for that.

I would liken this signing to that of Ashwell Prince at Lancashire. A good test match player (or a great one in Younis' case) who has the requisite qualities to succeed in all forms of the game at this level. He is proven in international and county cricket and should be a real success. Well done Surrey!