Ruddock says the European Challenge Cup is a good competition

Worcester Warriors director of rugby Mike Ruddock said it is important for his younger players to experience European rugby.

Warriors thrashed Italian side Petrarca 55-6 in the Challenge Cup on Saturday.

And Ruddock told BBC Hereford & Worcester the competition would be a good experience for his youngsters.

He said: "When you see the likes of Charlie Fellows, Alex Grove and Matt Cox, we are maybe a year away from doing well in the Heineken Cup."

Ruddock added: "With such great young players coming in and bonding together with those we blooded last year, it gives us the chance to build ourselves up into a team that could do well at that level.

"With the new players coming through and experienced men such as Chris Latham, who I thought had a great performance in Italy, we hope to be ready for it if we can get there this year."

We played some great rugby, moved the ball into space superbly at times and we scored some great tries Mike Ruddock

While the Challenge Cup has been criticised by some for being too easy for Premiership sides, Ruddock believes it is a good competition to be in.

"We used this competition last year to build success, momentum and confidence and we've got to do that again," he said.

"We played some great rugby, moved the ball into space superbly at times and we scored some great tries.

"We started really well, we said we needed to come out of the blocks in top gear and not have to grind out a victory and that's what we did.

"We scored some impressive tries early on and built our lead up but what really pleased myself and the backroom staff is that we didn't let them score a try.

"We've done a lot of work on our defence and, although we weren't really tested, it was important for us not to give any tries away as well."