YORKSHIRE'S new overseas star Morne Morkel has not quite gone under cover in his bid to fire the Tykes to glory over the next three months, but admits he will be doing a bit of fact finding ahead of South Africa's Test series against England this summer.

The 23-year-old all-rounder trained with his new county yesterday ahead of his debut in today's County Championship game against Nottinghamshire at Headingley Carnegie.

He was signed by the Tykes as cover for Rana Naved-ul-Hasan for the first part of the English domestic season.

But there were issues surrounding his availability because the Indian Premier League franchise the Rajasthan Royals, not realising he had a Yorkshire contract, bought him in the recent second round of player auctions.

Thankfully Manoj Badale, the owner of the Royals, accepted Yorkshire's agreement.

South Africa face England in a four Test series, starting on July 10, and Morkel said: "Graeme Smith has told me to keep my head down, don't talk to anyone, but listen to as many conversations as possible.

"No, I am only joking, he hasn't told me that at all! But this does give me the perfect opportunity to get used to English conditions ahead of the series.

"I desperately want to do well with Yorkshire. They are probably the biggest county in England, and it would be great if I could help them to win the Championship.

"They have got some fantastic bowlers in Matthew Hoggard and Darren Gough. Hopefully I can learn a lot from them."

Morkel played eight Twenty20 Cup games for Kent last summer, taking 11 wickets. He has since played five of his six Tests in 2008 against Bangladesh and India.

On July's Test series against England, he added: "We have been playing some unbelievable cricket recently. Our guys are scoring runs, and we have the bowlers to take 20 wickets.

"It should be a really great series.

It will be hard fought between two very good sides.''