Former England batsman Ian Ward has decided against a move to Hampshire.

Left-hander Ward, who has been offered the captaincy at Somerset and is also wanted by champions Sussex, let Hampshire manager Paul Terry know of his decision in a phone call on Monday.

It is a massive blow to Hampshire - the 30-year-old was at the top of Terry's list of targets after deciding to leave the Oval earlier this month

Terry, who returns to Perth this week, said: "Ian has decided to go elsewhere which is disappointing. There aren't a lot of English batsmen of his calibre available.

I don't know where he's going to go and he didn't give any reason for why he didn't want to come to us. It may be that he wants to play in the first division (of the championship) but our search will just have to continue.

"We'll now look to get a batsman in as our other overseas player but I'm pretty happy with a lot of our guys.

"We're hoping that they're going to improve and that we get more out of the guys that we've already got."