While batsmen enjoyed their time out there, the outing wasn't quite what India had in mind for the bowling attack fielded by the Virat Kohli led side during the standalone tour encounter against Cricket Australia XI in Sydney.

Keeping them on the field for more than 151 overs at the usual Sydney Cricket Ground surface, Cricket Australia XI piled on the agony before eventually getting dismissed for 544 with a first innings lead of 186.

Four batsmen from their side scored half-centuries, with wicketkeeper-batsman Harry Nielsen amassing a brilliant hundred to make the Indian bowlers toil extremely hard on a flat pitch.

Left-hander Nielsen was finally out caught in the deep to innocuous bowling of skipper Virat Kohli, but he didn't leave before being satisfied seeing the captain & his men "a bit grumpy" over home side's exploits.

"I think they were getting a bit grumpy, which was pleasing us. With an eye towards the first Test, we were sort of trying to keep them out there as long as we could and help the Test team out,” Nielsen was quoted saying by cricket.com.au, "I think we did our job beautifully batting for (151.1) overs. I bet they certainly didn’t plan on that, but they should’ve bowled us out."

"We were never going to declare, (hoping to) get plenty of overs into their quicks and wear them out a bit," he added.

Batting first, India reached 358 in the first innings with Prithvi Shaw, Cheteshwar Pujara, Virat Kohli, Ajinkya Rahane and Hanuma Vihari scoring half centuries. Before Murali Vijay scored a fantastic 129 on Day 4 and helped the visitors come out of the game with a respectable draw.

The Border-Gavaskar kickstarts with the first Test at Adelaide from Thursday, December 6.