Klinger to captain Warriors defence

Australia's most prolific limited overs batsman over the past 12 months, Michael Klinger will continue to press his claims for a belated national team call-up when he captains Western Australia in the Matador BBQs One-Day Cup.

Klinger starred as WA's top run-scorer in last year's Matador Cup victory to spark a sensational run of form that saw him dominate in the KFC Big Bash League, Sheffield Shield and most recently in England's county cricket for Gloucestershire.

After lifting Matador and BBL trophies last summer – and making the Shield final – Klinger lead Gloucestershire to England's domestic one-day crown, the county's first trophy since 2004.

Now, with Adam Voges on national duty in Bangladesh, Klinger will captain the Alcohol.Think Again Western Warriors in their bid to win back-to-back Matador Cup titles in Sydney next month.

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Ashton Turner, 22, will be Klinger's vice-captain, while 27-year-old former Tasmania batsman Jonathan Wells could be in line for a surprise Warriors debut, after being called up to strengthen Western Australia's batting list that will be without Test squad members Voges, Cameron Bancroft, Shaun Marsh and Mitchell Marsh.

Wells was delisted by the Tigers at the end of the 2014-15 season and moved to Western Australia to play club cricket for Perth, but remains contracted to the Hobart Hurricanes for the BBL.

Promising young batsmen William Bosisto and Tom Beaton have also been included in the squad.

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Former Australia under-19 batsman Beaton, 24, played 11 domestic one-day matches for the Warriors in 2010-11 and 2011-12, while Bosisto could play his first domestic one-day match since a one-off appearance in 2012.

The 22-year-old starred for Australia in the under-19 World Cup in 2012 and made three Shield appearances in 2013-14, and has been awarded a senior Warriors contract for 2015-16.

"We've got some good young players who've got some experience now and they'll step up," Warriors coach Justin Langer said.

"Our Matador Cup team is very similar to last year. We only lose Adam Voges and Craig Simmons from our 2014 side.

"We're looking to keep building this nursery and depth of talent."

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The Warriors will boast an enviable bowling attack featuring quick Nathan Coulter-Nile and spinner Ashton Agar fresh from Australia's one-day series against England, alongside the talents of pacemen Jason Behrendorff, Joel Paris, Nathan Rimmington and Andrew Tye.

Behrendorff has spent a frustrating five months recovering from injury after an excellent season across all three domestic formats last summer that saw him named Domestic Player of the Year at the Allan Border Medal evening.

Behrendorff's season was cut short after the Perth Scorchers won the BBL|04 title when an MRI revealed a partial fracture to a bone in his back, but he hopes a modified technique will allow him to again spearhead the Warriors' pace attack and prevent a recurrence of his back injury.

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Klinger will step into the captaincy after a phenomenal limited-overs season with Gloucestershire that saw him plunder 531 runs in eight innings with three centuries and two fifties.

He also scored 634 runs from 12 innings with another three tons in England's domestic T20 tournament.

Langer said the team would embrace the challenge of being the reigning champions.

"We're going to be hunted by everyone else," he said.

"No one likes to see a back-to-back champion and we'll certainly put our best foot forward to see if we can achieve that.

"It's not going to be easy and we'll have challenges, but we've had challenges for the last few years. The boys have found a way to overcome those and keep getting better and better."

Western Australia Matador Cup squad: Ashton Agar, Tom Beaton, Jason Behrendorff, William Bosisto, Nathan Coulter-Nile, Marcus Harris, Michael Klinger (capt), Simon Mackin, Joel Paris, Nathan Rimmington, Ashton Turner, Andrew Tye, Jon Wells, Sam Whiteman