Somerset secure Mendis and Pollard

ESPNcricinfo staff

	Ajantha Mendis will start Somerset's Championship campaign © Associated Press Enlarge

Somerset have signed Sri Lankan spinner Ajantha Mendis for the first few weeks of the County season.

Mendis, 25, will cover for Murali Kartik while he is at the IPL and brings experience of 15 Tests and 46 ODIs to Taunton. Somerset narrowly missed on silverware last year but have bolstered their Twenty20 hopes by resigning Keiron Pollard for the second half of the summer's FPt20.

Mendis will join up with Somerset ahead of the start of their Championship campaign at home to Warwickshire on 14 April. Somerset's director of cricket, Brian Rose, told the club's website: "We have said we would only bring in a top class performer as a replacement for Kartik if we could get one and feel that Mendis fits into that category so we are absolutely delighted about it."

Kartik was a major success in his first season at the County Ground, taking 78 wickets in total last summer, and the addition of Mendis will boost the county's hope of claiming their first ever title, having missed out to Nottinghamshire on the last day of the season in 2010.

Pollard's return will be celebrated by Somerset's fans after his match-winning performances in 2010. He told the club website:"I believe Somerset can win the FP t20 this year and I will be doing my best to make that happen."

Pollard scored a total of 354 runs, took 29 wickets and pulled off a match winning catch in the T20 semi-final victory over Nottinghamshire at the Rose Bowl.

He is likely to miss the first half of Somerset's FPt20 campaign because he will be playing for the West Indies against India in their ODI series