COACH Peter Moores has dismissed claims England skipper Paul Collingwood's off-field antics in South Africa was the catalyst behind his side's early elimination at the Twenty20 World Cup.

Having won their first match against Zimbabwe, England limped home after slipping to four consecutive defeats.

Collingwood has had a tournament to forget, misjudging a vital catch against South Africa that allowed Albie Morkel to make a match-winning 43 and miscalculating the number of overs Andrew Flintoff bowled against New Zealand in a five-run defeat.

But most importantly Collingwood was fined £1,000 after the Durham all-rounder visited a strip club just 24 hours before England crashed to a Super Eight loss against hosts South Africa.

"One of Paul biggest strengths is that he takes the good with the bad," said Moores. "He doesn't change much either way no matter what happens.

"It has been a tough tournament for him personally because we haven't performed as team. You have to be able to accept that, learn your lessons and move on and try and improve.

"He's learning masses as a captain because we've got this big patch of one-day cricket. He's a tough character and he's a worker, he's a grafter and gets stuck in.

"I don't think Paul was distracted during this tournament. The Twenty20 game is very quick and you have to make decisions and some work and some don't.

"We've seen in all games during the tournament that the skipper has had to make some brave calls and Colly has done that - he hasn't held back."

Moores refused to accept his one-day squad's morale had suffered an irreversible battering in South Africa and backed his newlook squad to bounce back during the five-match series in Sri Lanka next month.

Following a disastrous World Cup in March - England looked to have improved their limited-overs form after narrowly beating India 4-3 during the recent one-day series.

However, the withdrawal through injury of star all-rounder Andrew Flintoff and a broken thumb suffered by wicketkeeper Matt Prior has seen Moores' preparations thrown into turmoil ahead of the trip to the sub-continent.

"This performance won't have an effect because there are five changes in personnel," added Moores. "I don't think anyone thinks we're going to become a great one-day side overnight.

"We came here and we've had two really good chances to win matches against good sides like New Zealand and South Africa but didn't take them.

"But we have to take our performances and results on the chin and continue to set up chances to win matches.

"All the way through we're learning about how to play our best one-day cricket and it's part of a journey to get us to where we want to be, which is ultimately a successful side at the 2011 World Cup.

"The key is we take the lessons good and bad and learn from them and we move forward quickly because Sri Lanka is going to be a really tough test."