It’s now known to everyone that Musheer Khan, a 19-year-old prodigy who had an outstanding first-class season, is ready to leave for Australia on the India A shadow tour with three ‘four-day’ Tests. His double hundred in the Ranji quarter-final and a century he scored in the final match have earned him a place in India B’s 181 against India A. The Duleep Trophy performances and the Irani Cup match between Rest of India and Ranji champions Mumbai before touring Australia will determine the selection of players for India A team. While some Test specialists and pacers may depart early, it is safe to say that Musheer and Rajasthan left-arm spinner Manav Suthar are going to make it because Manav has surpassed Saurabh Kumar as the second-best left-arm spinner after Ravindra Jadeja and Axar.
At the moment, Musheer’s visit to Australia as an India A is a sure thing, provided there are no fitness problems.
Those who are well informed believe that his talent and inclination to score heavily in major situations such as the Ranji Trophy finals and against quality bowling attacks comprising Akash Deep, Khaleel Ahmed and Avesh Khan, will be of help to him.
Also, he has risen above others with his ability to bat for 373 balls (62.1 overs out of a total of 116) and forming partnerships with lower order batsmen like Navdeep Saini.
In respect of Suthar, Ajit Agarkar and co. are trying slowly to develop him into Axar’s deputy so that he can regularly tour A teams before Jadeja finishes playing and becomes the second left-arm orthodox bowler.
On the other hand, everyone was amazed by Sarfaraz Khan’s fearless attitude which he displayed during England’s home series while KL Rahul has experience that might be an advantage when determining India’s first playing XI in this season-opening Test series against Bangladesh starting September 19th at Chennai.
The belief is that Australia tour that will come up in November-December is the sole focus of both the management and selection committee while it puts Rahul in his advantageous position with his experience gained from 50 Tests.
This means team management has a situation between veteran test captain like KL Rahuls who have been there for nearly a decade versus younger stars like Sarfaraz who plays more flamboyantly but often fearlessly.
“As far as people outside know, they might not understand how a team runs including its systems. For instance when he played his last three Tests against South Africa KL scored a hundred -probably one of the best knocks recently recorded-86 at Hyderabad before injury made him miss out on playing more matches” stated PTI source under condition of anonymity.
“Archived due to inability rather than dropping out; He is fit again having scored fifty within Duleep then got some match time plus it’s certain that he would start,” BCCI officials said upon request for anonymity from PTI.
