Sri Lanka can celebrate the New Year after it survived two lapses to beat Australia A by five wickets in their one day cricket match at the MCG on Wednesday night.

Opener Marvan Atapattu's unbeaten 101 guided Sri Lanka home with eight balls left and just its second win of the tour.

After Australia A made 8-210 off its 50 overs thanks to Ryan Campbell's 61, Sri Lanka reached 5-211 in the 49th over with Atapattu and Russel Arnold (47 not out) combining for an unbeaten 78-run stand after the visitors lost 4-28.

Sri Lanka was cruising at 1-105 in the 27th opener before Nathan Hauritz (2-34) and Greg Blewett (1-19) applied the brakes.

When captain Sanath Jayasuriya was adjudged run out by the third umpire from Michael Clarke's throw, Sri Lanka had slumped to 5-133.

But Atapattu found form after amassing just 56 runs in the three tri-series matches to date and played the perfect foil to the dashing Arnold before almost 7,000 fans.

It was Sri Lanka's second win of the tour from six matches after beating a Victorian country XI on Sunday.

But against Australia and England it won't be able to afford too many lapses in the field like it did today.

Sri Lanka had Australia A on its knees at 7-137 in the 38th over after cashing in on some poor early batting from the home side.

Clarke (18) and Michael Hussey (seven) gave easy catches and Andrew Symonds (19) was stuck mid-pitch after a mix-up with Campbell after captain Jimmy Maher won the toss.

But Campbell (61 from 70) and Hauritz (23 not out) saved face brilliantly, adding 72 off 76 balls for the eighth wicket.

Campbell was at his inventive best and used his trademark scoop shot to take four off Pulasthi Gunuratna and help the A's scramble for 37 runs from the last five overs.

Campbell was the last man out, bowled by Jayasuriya with two balls left in the innings.

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