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I'm very excited to be joining Yorkshire," he told yorkshireccc.com on Thursday (July 27). "It will be a new and exciting experience for me. I just want to come over to this country and continue the good work I've been doing and learn from the whole experience. I'm determined to do my best for Yorkshire and perform as well as I know I can and contribute to some victories.

"It is hard work playing for different teams and still trying to be as professional as you can be. You've just got to adapt and learn about different people's cultures and just try to be the best I can be for the team. I'm a really aggressive player, I strive to be exciting and I like to entertain the fans."

I'm a really aggressive player, I strive to be exciting and I like to entertain the fans."

 I like to entertain the fans

Following the trail set by his mentor ya bwoy Pouty.

Dr Gulston was there to push him physically, but often pushing him in spirit was Kieron Pollard. The allrounder was going through an injury ordeal of his own after damaging his right knee while playing for Cape Cobras in South Africa's domestic Ram Slam T20. It caused him to miss West Indies' ride to the 2016 World T20 title and the early part of IPL 2016.

Pollard had already gone through a prior ordeal with a knee injury that forced him to sit out six months from 2013 into 2014. With that experience under his belt, Pollard served as a rehab mentor to Pooran. When Gulston wasn't working with both of them in person, the three kept in constant contact over WhatsApp.

"Polly would share some of his experiences and he would challenge [Pooran]," Gulston said. "They would make bets about doing different things and running different times. If Nicholas did certain exercises, Pollard would ask, 'What did you do today?' and I would have to take videos of it and send it to the group so Pollard, who was at the IPL, would see Nicholas doing stuff. Sometimes there would be a hundred messages popping up on the group, and it would just be the two of them going back and forth.

At the CPL draft that February, Pollard's Barbados Tridents took Pooran in the fourth round for US$90,000 - the same price Andre Russell fetched from Jamaica Tallawahs. It put Pooran in the top ten most expensive local players in the CPL, lofty status for someone whose last formal match at island level was in December 2014, and who was still rehabbing his way back from catastrophic leg injuries.

"I think Pollard was the one who made that decision," Pooran said. "It was a big call, especially being the captain of Barbados Tridents. He showed faith in me. He's a person who believed in me and that was a big risk for him to take, to convince the CPL owners to buy me. I had some pressure heading into CPL. It was always in the back of my head, 'What if I don't do good?'"


Pollard said that knowing what Pooran had gone through made him an inspiration for his team-mates. "I think he has been a revelation," Pollard said during the Tridents tour of Florida to end the 2016 CPL season. "Coming back from what he actually came back from, struggling and not being able to get into the Trinidad & Tobago team in 50-overs or four-day cricket. He played an entire season for Queen's Park. I thought there he did well. So he was looking forward to this tournament and he has shown what he can do.

"This is T20 cricket, so you don't expect a guy like that who bats and takes risks to be consistent. When he comes off, he wins games for you, and that's exactly what he did for us in a couple games. It could only go up from there for him. It's good to see that another youngster is coming out of hardship.