Indian colts will leave for South Africa on Sunday en route to New Zealand to defend their U-19 World Cup title.

The Under-19 World Cup is scheduled to be held from January 11-30 next year.

"World Cup is a very big platform for us. Anything you do will get you noticed. It can make your career. A good performance is like a ticket to the national squad," skipper Ashok Menaria told reporters, knowing very well that a good show can fetch them a ticket to the national team.

"However, all these will count for little if the team does not do well. We will benefit only if the team does well," he said.

The team will leave in the early hours on Sunday first to South Africa, where it will participate in a tri-series that will also include the home team as well as Sri Lanka, and then fly to New Zealand for the World Cup that is scheduled in January next year.

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In the run-up to the tournament, the team has undergone intense training sessions during a ten-day camp at the Bandra-Kurla Complex ground, practised fielding drills under the watchful eyes of India's new fielding coach Mike Young, besides receiving a pep talk from batting maestro Sachin Tendulkar.

"Ours is a balanced team. We have good spinners, proper pacers, besides all-rounders and batsman. We are confident of a good show," Menaria said.

"Harpreet (Singh) is the pace all-rounder for us, while I'm the spin-all rounder. Mandeep (Singh) is the Symonds for us as he can bowl both spin and pace," he added.

Asked whether the tag of being the defending champions will be a burden on the team, the skipper said, "They (the previous team) have set a standard for us and we will try to match their performance. We will take it match by match and worry about other factors later. Our first target is the tri-series in South Africa."

Meanwhile coach Chandrakant Pandit feels that the experience of having been together for a long time will stand his wards in good stead in the megaevent.

"If you look at the team besides 3-4 players most of them have been together since they toured Australia in April," Pandit said.

"Preparation wise we haven't missed out on much. The team also had three important sessions with Sachin (Tendulkar), (Michael) Young, and a sport psychologist Dr Bhimaraj. All we need is to have a good start in South Africa," he added.

Sachin's advice to U-19 team

While countering hostile conditions in New Zealand or South Africa is considered to be one of the biggest challenges for the Indian cricketers, the Junior World Cup-bound Under-19 team is hardly sweating over the prospect, courtesy some tips from none other than Sachin Tendulkar.

The batting maestro last week spoke to the young cricketers, who will play a tri-series in South Africa later in the month and then participate in the World Cup in New Zealand in January regarding the conditions and the challenges the team will encounter there, besides advising them on how to cope with it.

"Sachin talked to the team about the conditions. Besides he also advised them on how to approach the game, and what sort of technique batsmen have to adopt to be successful on those wickets," coach Chandrakant Pandit told reporters.

"His inputs are equal to almost half of our preparation that we would have had to do on reaching there (New Zealand)," he said.

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"To tackle the bounce on the wickets there, the colts have practised batting on wickets covered with wet plastic with a rubber ball being thrown at them," the coach said.

Not only batsmen, Tendulkar had a word of caution for the bowlers too.

"He told us not to get carried away with the wicket conditions. Besides he talked to us about the ideal length to bowl on such wickets to extract swing and also stop runs," said left arm pacer Jaidev Unadkat.

"You will get help but it it will be of no use if you do not pick up wickets, he advised us," Unadkat said.

Captain Maneria said, "Tendulkar told us that the South Indians in the team will have more problems in adjusting to the conditions than the North Indians as the North Indians are accustomed to the cold, while the South Indians are habituated to warm conditions.

Maneria said the team also received some advice from former cricketer Sandeep Patil, who is the National Cricket Academy chief.

"Patil sent us some notes about the weather conditions, bounce and the windy conditions. Every member of the team has a copy of the notes," he said.

Despite all the advice, according to Pandit the team's success in South Africa and New Zealand would depend on how fast the players acclimatise to the conditions.

"The challenge is to acclimatise, to handle the windy conditions, and getting used to it in the first two-three games itself," he said.