Australia's baseballers will head into next month's inaugural World Baseball Classic as underdogs despite winning a Silver Medal at the Athens Olympics in 2004

The 16-team Classic is the sport's equivalent to football's World Cup, with players from the American Major Leagues eligible to play

Australia has been drawn in a tough pool with the Dominican Republic, Venezuela and Italy

But coach Jon Deeble said Australia's record at an international level was strong
"The one thing that we understand and probably do as well, if not better than anyone else in the world, is understand tournament play" he said
"I'm confident we can win some games against these countries and go on to the next round and who knows, baseball's a funny game and anyone can win over nine innings"

But Deeble admitted his players would need to be at their best to be competitive

"If you look at the Dominicans, they had over 300 runs in the Major League last year
The Venezuelans are going to be tough too, and I think we can match it with Italy, even though they've got 25 major league players" he said

The World Baseball Classic will be staged in three countries - the United States, Japan and Puerto Rico - from March 3-20

Australia's Pool D matches will be played in Orlando, Florida