Bradford’s Adil Rashid is one of four Yorkshire players to have been named in the England Lions squad for the two-month tour of the West Indies in January.

The leg-spinning all-rounder joins Andrew Gale, Adam Lyth and Jonny Bairstow in the 17-man party, which also includes current Ashes ace Steven Finn for the first half of the trip.

Gale, Lyth and Bairstow will tomorrow fly back from Australia, where they have been for the last month on the ECB’s Performance Programme training camp.

Rashid was left out of the trip in order to give him some rare time away from the game but he has been back in pre-season training at Headingley in recent weeks.

The 22-year-old took 93 wickets in all competitions for Yorkshire during the 2010 summer.

Martyn Moxon, Yorkshire’s director of professional cricket, said: “Adil’s been going fine. He’s been a bit ill of late, so he’s not done too much cricket work with us, but other than his illness, he’s been going pretty well.

“I said that if he wasn’t going to be selected for the full Ashes tour, in my opinion, it would be a good idea to give him a break from cricket rather than go with the Performance Programme squad or anything like that.

“I think he will benefit in the long term from this bit of a break because he’s not had one prior to this for three or four years.”

The Lions, captained by Somerset’s James Hildreth instead of Gale, will be competing in the West Indian domestic tournament and will play seven four-day fixtures between January 24 and March 28.

Moxon said: “Playing competitive cricket over there will obviously be good development for them as well as providing them with the opportunity to push their claims for the full England sides.”

Gale and Lyth have both scored hundreds in four-day matches against Western Australia and Queensland recently, while Bairstow guided his side over the line against WA with an unbeaten 24 off 25 balls.

Lyth and Bairstow also undertook 12th man duties for the full England side during the first Ashes Test in Brisbane.

As far as Yorkshire are concerned, all four players will miss the majority of the county’s pre-season preparations, only arriving back in the UK 12 days before the English domestic season starts.