Finch, Maxwell to join Gillespie in Yorkshire

Aaron Finch and Glenn Maxwell are already teammates for the Victorian Bushrangers and Australia's T20 and ODI sides. This winter they will join forces with Jason Gillespie at Yorkshire in England.

In an Ashes winter, Finch and Maxwell will play for the Yorkshire Vikings in England's domestic Twenty20 competition.

Finch, who also played for the club last winter, will also play red-ball cricket for Yorkshire, England's reigning county cricket Division One champions, as well as in the domestic one-day competition.

The duo, who were until recently also housemates, will join Yorkshire in May after their Indian Premier League commitments. Maxwell plays for Kings XI Punjab and Finch will go under the hammer at the player auction, for which a date has yet to be announced, after being released by his side, Sunrisers Hyderabad.

Finch returns to Headingley for a second spell after a successful campaign last winter that he credited with rejuvenating in his form. His county cricket stint culminated in him stealing the show with a match-winning innings at the Lord's bicentenary celebrations alongside legends of the game such as Sachin Tendulkar, Brian Lara and Shane Warne.

Gillespie said he was delighted to secure the Victorians for the county in 2015.

"As a club we're absolutely thrilled to bits to be able to secure the services of two very exciting players in world cricket," said Gillespie.

"I spoke to Glenn a little while ago and just enquired as to whether he would be interested in representing Yorkshire and outlined how we saw how well he could fit into the dressing room and the role we wanted him to play.

"He jumped at the opportunity. I think that says a lot about our club, that players really want to come and play for us.

"Glenn has a fantastic all-round game. He's a clean striker of the ball, a wonderful fielder and he bowls some really good off-spin but what I'm excited about is what he can bring to specifically our T20 game, a bit of entertainment and a bit of excitement.

"He'll perform well for Yorkshire, no question and he'll bring something we need, that middle to late innings hitting and a good fielder as well as bowl some handy overs for us and really put a show on for the crowd.

"Aaron is a great leader, he has a lot of leadership and captaincy experience and having a player like that in the dressing room gives the younger players the opportunity to learn off him.

"He's very open with how he likes to go about things and how he tries to adapt to situations in the middle. Any player that can listen and learn from a successful international cricketer is very worthwhile."

Maxwell said chats with Gillespie and his close mate Finch had helped sway him but it was Australia's Bupa Support Team Head Coach Darren Lehmann, a former Yorkshire player himself, that made up his mind.

"I've had a couple of long discussions with Finchy and Boof (Lehmann) about Headingley and they can't speak highly enough of the place," Maxwell said in a statement on Yorkshire's website.

"Yorkshire is heading in the right direction. I'm looking forward to getting over later in the year and making a positive contribution."