Chasing 235, India A cantered to a three-wicket win over Australia National Performance Squad with 61 balls to spare. Left struggling on 63 for five after a top-order collapse, Kedar Jadhav and Sanju Samson helped India A to a comfortable win in the league match of the Quadrangular One-day series in Australia.
Electing to field first, India A sent back both the openers with 11 runs on the board. Kelvin Smith was run out while Matthew Short was trapped lbw by Rahul Shukla. Shukla also removed Alex Keath 29 runs later having laboured for nine runs. Rishi Dhawan later applied more pressure with the wicket of Travis Head to leave the home team tottering on 45/4.
Jordon Silk and Ashton Turner then joined forces to revive the NPS innings with a 94-run partnership until the former was run out. 37 runs later, Turner was sent back by Dhawan and NPS continued to lose wickets at regular intervals.
Lower-order batsman Sean Abott held up one end and with an unbeaten 41 and took the team to a competitive 234/9 even as he lost partners at the other end.
Abott who had impressed with the bat, then returned to remove Robin Uthappa and gave NPS their first breakthrough. Sam Rainbird followed it up with the key wicket of Manan Vohra 12 runs later. Manoj Tiwary, Manish Pandey and Ambati Rayudu too were back in quick succession leaving India reeling on 63/5.
However, Jadhav and Samson came to the visitors rescue and the pair stitched a 112-run partnership to bring India back in the game. While Jadhav was sent back by James Muirhead for 87, Samson took the team across the line with an unbeaten 55.
Brief scores
Aus NPS 234/9 in 50 overs (A Turner 73, J Silk 67, R Dhawan 2/38, R Shukla 2/54) lost to India A (K Jadhav 87, S Samson 55*, J Muirhead 4/92) by 3 wickets
