Hampshire manager Giles White says Australian batsman Marcus North may still play for the county this season – even if it is only for a few weeks.

North was due to play for Hampshire from the beginning of the season, April 15, until the end of May. But Hampshire have been looking for alternatives since the left-hander was called up to Australia’s one-day squad last week.

When Hampshire signed North two months ago, he had not represented his country.

But the 29-year-old scored a century on his Test debut against South Africa last month and his one-day call up means he is now set to miss Hampshire’s first three Championship matches of the season.

North, who is not playing in the third and final Test against South Africa in Cape Town because of illness, will now have to wait to become the first player to represent five counties at first-class level. But he could still play five Friends Provident Trophy group matches and a handful of Twenty20 games for the Hampshire Hawks before Imran Tahir returns in June.

White said: “There’s still a chance Marcus will be with us, possibly for the start of our Friends Provident Trophy and Twenty20 campaigns.”

With North definitely unavailable for the first three weeks of the season, Hampshire starlet James Vince did his chances of selection no harm at all by scoring a century in the second game of the county’s pre-season trip to South Africa yesterday.

Vince, 18 last week, helped the county beat a Western Province Academy side in Cape Town by 49 runs.

Stuart Clark, who would be a Hampshire target had he not signed for Kent, has hit back at the ECB’s criticism of counties for signing Australians before the Ashes.

The former Hampshire star said: “It has been surprising and over the top.”

Keep up to date with Hampshire cricket in the Daily Echo.