I was ecstatic to be picked for the England Lions recently, but there is still a way to go before I can think about playing international cricket.

At the moment, I would not even call myself the No 1 spinner at Middlesex because Ollie Rayner is a wonderful bowler. I need to establish myself more in county cricket and if I play well, who knows?

I’m happy to have been given more chances to play in the first team this season and feel there are periods where I have done well, but there is still quite a bit of improving to do moving forward.

I would like to have taken more four-day wickets because for me that is the toughest form of cricket.

It is about learning, adapting to the situation in a match and bowling as that dictates, whether it be attacking or defending.

It may be that my role is to block up an end for a session, so it is about learning to bowl to different field settings.

That said, being with the England Lions was a great experience and I feel I learned a lot in that environment.

I was bowling at better players every day and you experience a different level of intensity which demands that you’re switched on all the time.

I think I played pretty well, contributing to a good win over Sri Lanka, and I kept it tight against New Zealand, even though we did not manage to win that game.

Now I’m back at Middlesex, feeling fresh for the run-in and I’m excited about the challenge of the four games ahead. The last part of the season is an exciting time as so much can be achieved.

I’m not really worried about our position in the County Championship. Admittedly, we’re not ideally placed, but if we play good cricket we can shoot up what is still quite a compressed table.

We play well at Lord’s, where we have a good formula. Hopefully we can win at least one of the next two games there, against Warwickshire and Durham.