Dharamsala (Himachal Pradesh) [India], March 9 (ANI): Expressing disappointment with the manner of Sarfaraz Khan’s dismissal during India’s first innings during the fifth Test against England, legendary Indian batter Sunil Gavaskar shared the words of Australia’s legendary batter Don Bradman that expressed the importance of patience in Tests.
Sarfaraz has had an outstanding debut series so far as he has scored three fifties in the five innings he has played. He scored half-centuries in both of his innings of debut Test at Rajkot. He scored 62 off 66 in the first innings and played an unbeaten knock of 68 from 72 in the second.
Sarfaraz played a crucial knock of 56 runs which was laced by eight fours and a six on the second day of the last Test of the five-match series. He will have to convert his promising runs and starts into big scores since with Kohli, KL Rahul, Devdutt, Patidar, Jurel, Iyer, etc around there is a lot of competition for every spot in the middle order.
“The ball was pitched up; it wasn’t short enough for that shot. Goes for it and pays the price. I mean you are playing the first ball after tea. Give yourself a little sighter. Don Bradman said to me ‘Every ball that I face, even if I am on 200, I think I am on 0.’ And here is [Sarfaraz] is… playing such a shot first ball of the session,” Gavaskar said during commentary in JioCinema.
The Mumbai-born cricketer has performed exceedingly well in the domestic circuit before making his international debut.
The 26-year-old player has scored 3505 runs in 37 first-class matches. He has an outstanding average of 79.65 and has struck 13 hundred. His highest knock is 301* in domestic games.
In List A cricket, he has scored 469 runs with an average of 39.08 in 26 matches. He also has two centuries in list cricket.
In the 2022-23 Ranji Trophy season, Sarfaraz scored 556 runs with an impressive average of 92.66. He has also bagged three centuries in 6 matches.
The Mumbai batter was the leading run-scorer in the year 2022 where he had struck 982 runs with an average of 122.75 in six test matches. He had four hundred under his belt.
In 2019-2020, he was amongst the top five run-getters in the Ranji Trophy. He scored 928 runs at an average of 154.66 in six games. He had hit three centuries with the career-best knock of 301* in first-class cricket.
Coming to the day’s action, England managed to make a comeback in the third session after skipper Rohit Sharma (103) and Shubman Gill (110) dominated the opening and the second session. Off-spinner Shoaib Bashir used the extra bounce and turn that was on offer to reduce India to 428/8.
Gill’s 110-run knock helped him complete 4000 international runs on Friday.
Kuldeep Yadav and Jasprit Bumrah put up an unbeaten 45-run stand to ensure India didn’t lose any wickets. (ANI)
