Ayush Mhatre-led Indian team defeat Australia convincingly by 7 wickets, take valuable lead in ODI series

The India U-19 side got their three-match ODI series against Australia U-19 off to a brilliant start as they ended up defeating the hosts comprehensively by seeven wickets in the first game. It was a superb all-round performance from Ayush Mhatre & Co. as they first restricted Australia to a gettable total and then went on to chase down the target in just 30.3 overs at the Ian Headly Oval in Brisbane.

Australia won the toss and elected to bat first, but had quite a disastrous start to their innings as pacer Kishan Kumar struck twice in the first over of the match itself. Opening batters Alex Turner and Simon Budge both lost their wickets for ducks as the visitors began the match with a bang.

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The next batters tried to provide some much-needed stability to the side, however failed to hold on for very long as Will Malajczuk lost his wicket in the eighth over to Henil Patel. Yash Deshmukh would provide India with another wicket in the very next over before the duo of Steven Hogan and Tom Hogan formed an important partnership. However, the Indian bowlers will once again manage to break through the Australian batting order and if it wasn't form John James' stunning knock of 77 runs, things would have ended up going from bad to worse for the hosts.

Thanks to James' valiant inning, Australia managed to post a respectable total of 225/9 in 50 overs. For India, Henil Patel was the pick of the bowlers as he recorded figures of 3/38 in his 10-over spell. Kishan Kumar and Kanishk Chouhan also contributed well and picked up two wickets each.

Suryavanshi got India off to an incredible start

In reply, India had a flying start to the run-chase thanks to Vaibhav Suryavanshi's fireworks. Though the left-hand batter got dismissed in the fifth over, he inflicted a lot of damage to the opping bowlers and departed after scoring 38 runs from just 22 deliveries. However, despite making a fantastic start, the Men in Blue ended up losing Mhatre and Vihaan Malhotra cheaply which restricted them to 75/3 at one stage.

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But an amazing partnership between Vedant Trivedi and Abhigyan Kundu saw India cruise towards the 226-run target. The 152-run stand saw Trivedi remain unbeaten on 61 and Kundu remain unbeaten on 87 as Ayush Mhatre & Co. made an incredibly strong start to the three-match assignment. They will now be having a chance to seal the series in the second match which will be played at the same venue on September 24.