England Academy director Peter Moores is backing Alex Loudon to emerge from his unfulfilled winter and develop into a potential England player.

The Warwickshire middle-order batsman and off-spin bowler endured a fluctuating winter, bowling only four competitive overs during England's pre-Christmas tour to Pakistan and then experiencing a modest A tour to West Indies.

It was the type of winter which can test the resolve and determination of emerging players, particularly after he experienced the disappointment of missing out on the recent tour to India.

But Moores believes he will be better for the experience and Loudon demonstrated his resolve with a determined 123 for the MCC at Lord's on Monday, although he could not prevent them slipping to a 142-run defeat against champions Nottinghamshire in the traditional curtain-raiser to the season.

Moores, the coach of the winter A tour and previously in charge of Sussex, said: "I think this is a great end to his winter phase in some ways.

"He went to Pakistan and didn't play but part of the reason why he went was to get experience with England.

"He worked at his game having seen what he wanted to do, went to the West Indies and looked like he was getting his game together but didn't quite get the runs on the board he wanted.

"I thought he looked a very good player against Nottinghamshire, very simple and nice and calm at the crease, and it was a very good hundred.

"It's set him up nicely to go back to Warwickshire and like all these lads it's about going back to your county and getting runs and wickets and putting pressure on and developing themselves as players - from that point of view it's been great for him and it's wrapped up the whole winter."

Moores believes the work Loudon has done with newlyinstalled England spinning coach Dave Parsons in the Caribbean will be particularly helpful to him during this season as he tries to establish himself in Warwickshire's line-up and then interest the selectors.

Loudon's next challenge is forcing his way into the reckoning for the England A squad to take on Sri Lanka in a four-day match at Worcester starting on May 5.

Moores said: "Alex, like lots of young spinners, needs to play and needs to bowl overs. Alex hasn't bowled that many overs in games yet.

"What he has done is work really hard with Dave Parsons at making his stock delivery better by hard work and that's starting to come through in his bowling.

"He's been up with England and has talked to Duncan Fletcher [the England coach] about this and that and has come back to us and has worked through some of these things."

Monday's century, only his second in first-class cricket, forced Loudon to re-evaluate how he approached his batting.

He said: "I applied a lot more of a rigid game-plan than perhaps I have in previous years and hopefully I will be able to play a few more long innings.

"It's come from a realisation that I haven't scored big runs before. This innings is OK but I need to score more this year because we've got good competition at Warwickshire."

But Loudon is aware that he has a long way to go to convince Fletcher that he is a realistic spinning all-rounder option at the highest level. He said: "Any experience is good in my view, so going away with the England team was fantastic and not being picked is another experience you go through.

"Millions of players have been through it and I was very fortunate to go to Pakistan - I don't look back and think I've had a bad winter at all."