WORCESTERSHIRE wicketkeeper Ben Cox has been called up to the England Lions squad for the remaining four matches of the 50-over series in Australia to replace the injured Tom Moores.

Nottinghamshire’s Moores was injured during training on Sunday and with the four matches being played in the space of eight days the decision was made for him to return to England to recover.

The Lions will face Cricket Australia XI in two more limited-overs matches on the Gold Coast, having won the first match of the series on Sunday.

They then travel to Sydney to play two matches against a New South Wales XI.

Meanwhile, Jack Haynes hit a half-century as England under 19s triumphed by 152 runs in the ICC World Cup Plate final against Sri Lanka in Benoni.

It gave the Worcestershire batsman and his team-mates revenge for their defeat in the final of the Tri-Series in the Caribbean in December.

Haynes featured in a third-wicket partnership of 142 in 27 overs with century-maker Dan Mousley.

He came to the wicket at 59-2 in the 11th over and struck five boundaries in his 68 made from 78 deliveries.

Haynes was third out with the total on 201 in the 38th over when dismissed by off-spinner Ashian Daniel.

It was his third ODI half-century for England under 19s.

Haynes had previously made 74 against South Africa at Gosforth in 2018 and 89 versus India at Cheltenham last year.

Mousley went on to make 111 and then a late 59 from Joey Evison carried England’s final total to 279-7 from 50 overs.

Sri Lanka were dismissed for 127 in 31 overs with Haynes running out Sonal Dinusha.

Seven of Worcestershire’s academy players are heading to India later this month to reap the benefits of the Global Cricket School.

Alex Hinkley, Peter Clark, Ed Bragg, Josh Dickenson, Henry Cullen, Rehaan Edavalath and Harry Cooke will fly out to Mumbai on February 14 for the nine-day trip.

Worcestershire academy coach Elliot Wilson and head of coach and player development Kevin Sharp will be accompanying the youngsters.

The seven are all part of the 2019-2020 academy intake with the other two Reeve Evitts and Ollie Walker being part of the Worcestershire under 17s squad who will be in action in St Lucia at the same time.

Wilson believes the sheer volume of cricket training, conversations about cricket and how batsman and bowlers learn to cope with different conditions to those in England will be of enormous benefit in their bid to become professional cricketers.

He said: “It has always been identified that what we would love to be able to do is provide this overseas experience for our best young players.

“Sachin Bajaj, who runs the Global Cricket School, has been supporting groups from England going out to India for 15 years now.

“This year we’ve got the capacity to do it and just before Christmas I sat down with the Global Cricket School and Sachin Bajaj and we were able to organise a trip for this February half-term.

“We fly out on February 14 and return on Sunday 23.

“We’ve got eight days on Indian soil training with seven of the academy players and we are looking forward to taking them away.

“With these young lads I don’t think anyone realises just how much cricket they have to physically do to get to where they need to get to become a professional cricketer.

“The sheer quantity of contact time, seven or eight days of just cricket conversations and focusing on training, can only be beneficial.

“There also is that specific intention to see how we bowl on those surfaces because we’ve got a few good spinners in the group travelling with us and also how we bat on those surfaces. That will be quite exciting.

“The local bowlers come in and bowl, the net bowlers from around the Mumbai area, morning and afternoon to have a bowl at the lads.”

Worcestershire have made several trips to the school in recent years but this is the first time a full group of academy players have been chosen.

In 2015 Daryl Mitchell, Tom Fell, Brett D’Oliveira and Josh Dell of the current professional squad made the trip.

Two years ago Cox, Fell, Ed Barnard and Ben Twohig went there.