ANDY Flower has praised the “excellent job” undertaken by Worcestershire director of cricket Steve Rhodes at first-team level and also further down the scale at New Road.

Flower, the England and Wales Cricket Board technical director of elite coaching, was speaking after another New Road product Ollie Westbury scored 196 on his national under 19s debut against Sri Lanka A.

Westbury was one of five County players selected for the squad in addition to the senior team's Moeen Ali and England Lions' Joe Clarke and Brett D’Oliveira.

Flower, who watched last week’s Royal London One-Day Cup match with Northamptonshire at New Road, said: “It is an encouraging sign for Worcestershire.

“Steve has done an excellent job here, not only with the main side and with resources that pale into insignificance compared to some of the other bigger, more affluent counties.

“I do know that the best coaches at Worcester also work with some of the younger guys, which isn’t the case at a number of counties.

“That sort of representation in the under 19 age group reflects really well on Worcestershire and the job the leadership there are doing.”

Westbury batted for nearly eight hours to achieve the highest score at England under 19 level by a Worcestershire player.

Former England head coach and Zimbabwe international Flower said: “I was sitting watching the 50-over game with Steve and Matt Mason (assistant-bowling coach) and they were keeping an eye on his score.

“That is great for him and for Worcestershire.

“Some really fine cricketers have come from this part of the world and, even though it is very early for Westbury, I’m sure he is really proud of it and that’s a great start for him.

“The under 19 system under Andy Hurry is a really good system with a really good guy leading it, so I’m very happy for all of them but in this case especially for that young batsman.”