Thoroughly outplayed by Australia A in the league stage, India A will have to play out of their skin to upstage the in-form team from Down Under when the two sides clash in the ODI tri-series final here on Friday.
A barely fit South Africa are out of contention after losing all their matches, done in to an extent by the food poisoning which left 10 of their players hospitalised.
India have made the final owing to massive wins over this beleaguered side. Against Australia A, however, the story has been one of disappointment. Neither the batting nor the bowling has been quite upto the mark against the Aussies barring a couple of players, who have sparkled.
Opener Mayank Agarwal has been one such bright spot with a tally of 377 runs from four matches to be placed on top ahead of Aussie Joe Burns (228 runs) in the leading run-getters list in the tri-series. Mayank, in fact, played out a sensational 176-run knock against South Africa A on Thursday in the team’s final preliminary match. Skipper Unmukt Chand (211) has also got three fifties in four games but failed to fire in the team’s previous league match against the Australians.