South Africa A ready to hit the ground running on Sri Lanka tour

The South Africans will face the Sri Lanka second stringers in three one-day and two four-day matches starting in Kandy on Sunday with De Zorzi leading the 15-man squad under the guidance of Proteas Test coach Shukri Conrad.

Most of the squad have spent the last week in Pretoria where they have been preparing for the tour at the CSA centre of excellence with the skipper saying the preparation camp was extremely beneficial for everyone.

"We caught a lot of the nets, we had double sessions most of the days morning, followed by afternoon sessions," De Zorzi commented. "We also had a couple of warm-up games and then middle session scenarios.

"It's always nice to be in the middle, spend time on the legs for the batters and for the bowlers to get a proper feel of some game time with some match-like intensity and then obviously preparing for certain conditions as well.

"So I think preparations have gone really well and everyone is ready to go and hit the ground running come the weekend."

De Zorzi, who is coming off a promising debut season of international cricket where he made his Test debut against the West Indies, is looking forward to the trip, which begins with a one-day clash in Kandy.

"I'm quite excited about the challenge of leading the 'A' side for this tour," he said. "It's a massive honour and I'm really pleased to be given the job.

"We have a very talented squad of players that have been put together by coach Shukri. I'm pleased to be working with them and look forward to learning from them as well."

The squad includes several Proteas in Keegan Petersen, Kyle Verreynne, Gerald Coetzee, Senuran Muthusamy, Tristan Stubbs, Lizaad Williams, Sinethemba Qeshile and Lutho Sipamla. Zubayr Hamza is also returning to the national setup.

Some of the country's most exciting young players have also made the cut, amongst them being batters Dewald Brevis and Jordan Hermann.

De Zorzi added: "We want to obviously go there and win both series, that's the main target. We also want to see players develop in different conditions at the same time, so that is the aim."