Australia Name Playing XI For Tournament Opener Against South Africa A

Cricket Australia on Wednesday announced their playing eleven ahead of their tour opening match against South Africa A starting at Willowmoore Park on Thursday. The only likely member of the Australian squad who is missing from the starting eleven and may miss the warm-up match is opener David Warner, who was captaining Australia's Twenty20 team in the final of a triangular tournament in Auckland, New Zealand, which they won by 19 runs in a ran-hit match. The South Africa A team includes five players with international experience.

Assistant coach David Saker, who was in-charge of the Australian squad, said that the visitors will aim to maintain their form from the Ashes triumph and win the four-match Test series. 

"We just want to go out and win and play really well," Cricket.com.au quoted Saker as saying.

"It's really important that we put in a good performance and learn from some of the things we did during the summer. It's our only hit-out so we'll play as strong a side as we can and get use to the conditions," Saker further added.

"Some of these guys haven't played for a while, so it will be good for them to get out and have a hit-out. It looks a pretty good wicket. To be fair, four days ago it looked quite poor but it looks quite good now. We'll just go out and play and try to adapt to the conditions we get," Saker remarked.

The first of four Tests starts in Durban on March 1.

Teams:

South Africa A: Khaya Zondo (captain), Theunis de Bruyn, Zubayr Hamza, Beuran Hendricks, Pieter Malan, Wiaan Mulder, Senuran Muthusamy, Duanne Olivier, Rudi Second (wkt), Malusi Siboto, Shaun von Berg.

Australia: Steve Smith (captain), Usman Khawaja, Peter Handscomb, Shaun Marsh, Mitchell Marsh, Tim Paine (wkt), Pat Cummins, Mitchell Starc, Nathan Lyon, Josh Hazlewood.

(With AFP inputs)