India chased down the target of 226 runs that the defending champions set up after being called in to bat, with six wickets remaining and 14 balls to spare. Skipper Unmukt Chand slammed an unbeaten century guiding India to their third U-19 World Cup title defeating Australia in the final on Sunday.
Batting first, Australia lost four wickets at the score of 38. It was Trevor Head and captain William Bosisto who stemmed the flow of wickets and it took a run out to break the partnership that had grown to 65.
Next to join Bosisto was Ashton Turner who scored 43 to add 93 for the sixth wicket with the Aussie skipper. Man of the series, Bosisto top scored for the hosts with 87* while for India Sandeep Singh took 4/54. Spinner Harmeet Singh kept the batsmen in check returning with figures of 1/36 in 10 overs.
Indian chase also started on a negative note as they lost the wicket of in-form Prashant Chopra (0) in the first over itself. Baba Aparajith and Unmukt Chand then steered the innings forward scoring at a brisk pace adding 73 for the second wicket before Aparajith was brilliantly caught by Turner at extra cover.
Two more quick wickets and India looked a bit shaky. The Australians had them under pressure with two consecutive maidens that eventually led to the dismissal of Vijay Zol who poked at a wide delivery edging it to the keeper. Hanuma Vihari was caught by Turner off his own bowling to leave the 2008 champions tottering.
In came Smit Patel and joined his captain to first calm things down in the middle. The run rate had climbed to over six an over.
The duo managed to keep their heads calm and cool and refrained from taking any unnecessary risk seeing the overs of seamers Joel Paris and Gurinder Sandhu who bowled with tight line and length.
Unmukt Chand was dropped by his counterpart when he was on 84 and it proved to too costly for the Australians as he went on to complete his century that turned out to be the decisive factor.
Patel, who had also reached his half-century, sealed the victory with boundary towards midwicket region as the Indian squad broke into wild celebrations.
It's all over! Patel seals with a four as India become U-19 World champions for the third team defeating Australia in the final by six wickets.
Unmukt Chand has played the innings of a captain here registering a century in the final. There were moments of uncertainty when the run flow stopped and the wickets of Aparajith, Vihari and Zol fell in quick succession. The skipper, however, remained calm and along with wicketkeeper-batsman Smith Patel drove them home with 14 deliveries to spare.
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