A confident India A, boosted by Shikhar Dhawan’s brilliant double century, will take on their consistent Australian counterparts in what promises to be a high-scoring tri-series final on an absolute featherbed at the LC de Villiers Stadium on Wednesday.
India have lost both their round-robin league matches against the Australians by close margins but Cheteshwar Pujara and Co. will hope that ‘law of averages’ catches up with the opposition side.
India A will certainly go into the match with a lot of confidence after Monday’s ‘Dhawan Mayhem’ against the Proteas but Australia, who have been the best side in the tournament, will certainly chalk out some elaborate plans to stop the star-studded rival batting line-up.
All eyes will be on Dhawan, who has dazzled with his superb strokeplay, and one would expect him to fire when it matters the most.
As far as the batting is concerned, India appear to have ticked all the boxes in the tri-series with each and every top-order batsman getting runs.
While Dhawan, with 348 runs from three games (one game rested), leads the tally, skipper Pujara has come back to form with a half-century and a century in successive games.
While Rohit Sharma has been a picture of consistency with a hat-trick of 50s, Ambati Rayudu and Suresh Raina have also chipped in with useful contributions.
For India, the worrying factor will be how their inexperienced bowling attack performs against some of the quality batsmen in the opposition ranks.
Shaun Marsh, with two centuries, and Glenn Maxwell, with a couple of blistering knocks in successive matches against the Indians, are potential game-changers that Pujara and his men will be wary of.
The Indian bowlers have had a tough time on traditional belters with all the specialist bowlers going for six plus runs per over.
Left-arm spinner Shahbaz Nadeem has been the pick of the bowlers with six wickets and an economy rate of 6.09.
The Indian new ball bowlers Jaydev Unadkat, Mohammed Shami, Siddharth Kaul and Ishwar Pandey have all been hit for runs although they have got a few wickets also.