By Huzaifa Yousafzai from Utilita Bowl
Hampshire travelled up to Durham as their bid for a long-awaited Division One County Championship title began. Unfortunately, no play commenced due to inclement weather.
However, one man who didn’t make the trip but is of high interest to many, including the England camp, is 23-year-old John Turner.
The South African born express seam bowler has very quickly risen from Hampshire’s academy to being called up for England squads twice during the winter.
“It’s caught me off guard at the speed at which it’s happened. I couldn’t have ever seen that coming” said John Turner on a rainy morning at the Utilita Bowl.
Despite being so highly rated due to his speed and skill, Turner has only played three First Class and 15 List A games in his short career so far.
“I really enjoyed the rise over the last few months, although that being said I still haven’t really played that much cricket. Although it looks like a lot has happened, cricket wise not much has changed.”
Alongside fellow English pace bowlers Saqib Mahmood and Matthew Fisher, Turner is currently under a development contract with ECB.
“It’s really nice to know that I’m on their radar and they have an interest in me. It’s nice looking at the fast bowlers coming through at the moment and it’s really promising on the English front. If you look a year or two ahead you’ve got the ashes and quite a few test matches as well. A lot of promising youngsters are already contracted so to be below them and see how they do it and try to replicate it has been quite exciting.”
Turner is pleased with the current balance between bowling workloads for club and country, acknowledging the positive impact it will have on his career.
“The way it works between Hampshire and England in terms of the balance and the collaboration to get the most out of my cricket works really well.”
Hampshire currently have one of the best seam bowling attacks in the country, consisting of Keith Barker, Mohammed Abbas and Kyle Abbott. All three of them have over 500 First Class wickets each with Abbas and Abbot having played several years of Test Cricket.
“Since I arrived at Hampshire, I’ve really enjoyed working with them (Abbas, Abbott and Barker) and being able to learn from them. Hopefully I can get a bit more opportunity to play with them and see how they do it in a game environment and take that on to further my development.”
However outside of cricket, Turner is studying finance as a 3rd year student at Exter University, which is something he says gives him a good balance.
“I think having University with it has been very good as it kind of brings me back down to earth and gives me something outside of cricket.”
Turner will hope to get on the field very soon and show everyone why there is so much excitement surrounding him.
