Cooper, Marsh star in NPS rout

Tom Cooper's fluent century and a maiden List A five-wicket haul from Mitchell Marsh helped Australia A beat National Performance Squad (NPS) by seven wickets in the Quadrangular A-Team One-Day Series in Darwin.

Cooper's solidity assuaged an early wobble. Australia A were 2 for 48 in the 12th over before he took over and slammed his 11th four to close the game with nearly eight overs to spare. He walked off unbeaten on 109 off 110 balls to usher his side to a third win from four games.

His innings came on the back of a bowling display from Marsh who whittled out four of the top five batsmen before they could pose much threat. NPS, having elected to bat, were 4 for 58 when Ashton Turner struck a breezy 59 off 53 balls. The lower-middle order held the other end long enough for him to lift the score to 165 before he was sixth man out. With Turner at the crease, the fifth and sixth wickets added 64 and 43 runs to the total, but tail could not muster the same kind of effort. Marsh finished with 5 for 50 and Australia A were set a modest target of 215.

Seamer Sean Abbott continued his promising form, nipping out both openers but his miserly efforts - 9-0-27-2 - came in second best to Cooper's well-paced innings. A sedate 76-run stand for the third wicket with South Australian team-mate Callum Ferguson preceded a more aggressive and unbeaten 92-run partnership with Moises Henriques for the fourth to seize the game.