Central Districts have signed Somerset all-rounder Peter Trego as their overseas player for the upcoming season.

Trego, a 31-year-old, hard-hitting batsman and pace bowler, was looking forward to joining the Stags for the HRV Cup Twenty20 competition.

“I am delighted to have signed for Central Districts as it has always been a target of mine to play in New Zealand at some stage of my career and thankfully CD has given me that opportunity," he said. "I'm always looking to develop my game and this should be another positive challenge.

“Hopefully I can deliver enough runs and wickets that will help bring success to the team. I am excited especially about bowling in New Zealand as I think the conditions will suit me. I'm really looking forward to the season and meeting my new team-mates and the supporters.”

Stags coach Alan Hunt was pleased to confirm the signing.

“We are delighted to have confirmed Peter's availability so early in the season as this allows us time to develop the rest of the squad knowing that we have a quality all-rounder.”

With the Black Caps in Sri Lanka and South Africa at the same time as the HRV Cup, Hunt sought to add experience to the youthful Stags squad.

“With Michael Mason having retired last season and Doug Bracewell, Jacob Oram and Adam Milne all in the Black Caps mix, we felt that we needed to add experience to the side, particularly someone that can bowl at the death of the innings,” Hunt said.

“We discussed a number of options with our senior players and Peter's name kept coming up as someone that they all believed would be a great addition to our side. Peter can take the new ball and bat aggressively at the top of the order which will hopefully give us good impetus at the start of an innings.”

Rather than bringing overseas players in on a game-by-game basis CD have stuck to their strategy of signing a player for the duration of the competition.

While Trego will not arrive in time for the Stags' opening HRV Cup match in November, he will be available for all remaining games in the competition as well as two Plunket Shield fixtures in December. Fairfax NZ

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