India and South Africa teams after ICC U-19 World Cup warm-up. (ICC Photo)
Only two teams had managed to play out their 50 overs on day one of the warm-up games in New Zealand. So day two was expected to be similar and eventually it turned out to be. Out of the eight teams that played on day one, no team batting second managed to chase down the total so when India U-19 team captain Prithvi Shaw won the toss in Christchurch, he had no doubt in electing to bat against South Africa U-19 team. After a slow start and mini-collapse in the middle order, India recovered to post 322 for 8 and then, conitnuing the trend at ICC U-19 World Cup warm-up games, bowled out South Africa before they could chase that total down, securing a 189-run victory in their first warm-up.
After the lower middle-order made its mark in the first innings, Bengal pacer Ishan Porel ran through the South Africa top order and finsihed with four wickets for 24 runs in his eight overs to make sure the Proteas never had a chance of chasing India’s total.
India got 12 runs off the first over with Shaw and Manjot Kalra opening the batting but then slowed down. They did manage an opening stand of 54 runs off 10.4 overs but the Indian captain was dismissed on individual score of 16. Two balls later, Shubman Gill was trapped in front of the wickets by Akhona Mnyaka and India were reduced to 54/2.
Mnyaka was not finished yet. Kalra, who looked good in his 31 runs, was removed 10 balls later. Three of India’s star batsmen were back in the hut. Himanshu Rana and Aryan Juyal began the rebuilding work and by the time they were separated, they had made sure India were not bowled out tamely.
A 138-run stand between Rana and Juyal off 138 balls gave India the stability and a platform for the lower order batsmen to go for the kill in the final overs. Juyal deserved a century but was dismissed for 86. Rana too was back in the pavillion after making 68 runs.
But, Abhishek Sharma (35), Anukul Roy (28) and Kamlesh Nagarkoti (26) scored runs at an individual strike-rates of more than 130 and lead India’s total past 300.