STEVE RHODES COLUMN

IT has been a quiet week for us, but that has come at a nice time after the hard work of the Twenty20 Cup.

I know it is only 20 overs and it is quite late in the day, but the pace of the game is full-on and it can be quite draining for the players, so it is good that we have had a few days without a game to recover.

The players have been in for net sessions, but they have also had a couple of days off.

We are looking forward to getting back into Championship cricket this week. We won't be worrying too much about what Surrey are doing at the top of the league, we will just concentrate on winning our games and keeping the pressure on them.

We've got one game in hand on Surrey and if we can beat them again that is like a double-pointer and if we can beat the teams below us, that will kill them off one by one.

We will have Phil Jaques back for the Championship game against Glamorgan at Colwyn Bay, which starts on August 2.

He is quite used to coming backwards and forwards from Australia, so he should be fine to go straight into that game.

I spoke to him this week and he said he was disappointed not to have gone on to get big scores -- like he has done for us -- in the Australia `A' four-day game with Pakistan `A' when he was out for 60 and 48.

Phil obviously wants to play for Australia and in a year's time he will probably be the best candidate to replace one of the current openers.

We have put in a 28-day notice of our intention to talk to Moeen Ali. He is a promising young England under 19 player -- a left-hander -- who can bowl useful off-spin too.

We have put in a 28-day notice of our intention to talk to Moeen Ali. He is a promising young England under 19 player -- a left-hander -- who can bowl useful off-spin too.

I'm sure that other counties will be interested in him, but I feel confident that he will be excited by what Worcestershire has to offer. He is in the last year of his contract with Warwickshire so we were allowed to make an approach for him. His brother, Kadeer Ali, played for us and his cousin, Kabir Ali, is here now, so the family know the set-up here well.

Some of our younger players have been doing well for their club sides and the seconds too.

Will Gifford did very well to score a hundred for Kidderminster against Old Hill and I was really pleased for him.

Daryl Mitchell and Zafran Ali also scored runs at the weekend. Damien D'Oliveria and I take a keen interest in the youngsters and if they are the type of players who are going to make it in county cricket, they need to dominate at club level. When they do well, it doesn't go un-noticed in the dressing room -- the first-teamers are always talking about the younger lads who have done well.

Shaftab Khalid has also had a very good middle part of the season. He has not had a lot of opportunities at Old Hill, but he has done well for our seconds.

On the injury front, Nadeem Malik has started to bowl off a few paces. He is only bowling off a short run-up, but it is good to see him running in and bowling again.

When he is fully fit again, he needs to get a few overs under his belt in the seconds and try and push his way back into the first team.