Former Indian cricketing legend, the Prince of Kolkata – Sourav Ganguly has put forward the next target to achieve for Mumbai-born batter Sarfaraz Khan who made a dreamy Test debut for India in their 3rd Test win at Rajkot by 434 runs. The right-hand aggressive batter smacked back-to-back fifties across innings to become the 4th Indian to do such a thing after Dilawar Hussain, Sunil Gavaskar, and Shreyas Iyer.
The fact that Sarfaraz Khan is going through a period of roses and daffodils in his initial international cricketing career, has a lot to do with his constant grind for Mumbai in Ranji Trophy. His compiling runs after runs, season in and season out has been widely appreciated by every former cricketer in the country and also by skipper Rohit Sharma.
Sarfaraz Khan’s constant Ranji Trophy grind, saluted by Sourav Ganguly
Even after scoring a lot of runs in the domestic circuit, Sarfaraz had to wait for a long time to be considered for India’s selection and if the day of that sort arrived, it was solely because of his sheer hard work and outstanding patience level. His father Naushad Khan too has played a major role in his journey and in his run-scoring spree in the domestic red-ball circuit which saw him score 4042 runs at 70.91.
Sarfaraz Khan’s journey from the Maidans of Mumbai to the senior dressing room is something to be admired, feels Sourav Ganguly who claimed that the upcoming lot of cricketers should take learnings from him and also from his 22-year-old teammate Yashasvi Jaiswal.
“Jaiswal is not only a good player, he’s capable of playing all in formats of the game. Sarfaraz has started well. He now has to score in foreign countries. Sarfaraz is a good example for budding cricketers, who must keep in mind that if they score consistently, they will get their chances.” – Ganguly told Mid Day outlet.
Sarfaraz’s debut Test innings in Rajkot came on day 1 when Rohit Sharma departed from the crease after amassing 132 runs and standing for a 204-run partnership with Ravindra Jadeja to take India from 33/3 to 237/4. The stage was perfectly set for the 26-year-old to come in and express himself like he has been doing for Mumbai in the Ranji Trophy since 2014.
And so he did by batting at a strike rate of 93, scoring a tremendous debut fifty, helped India cross the 300 mark but left the crease as a result of an unfortunate run-out which was entirely Jadeja’s mistake. After that 62 off 66, Sarfaraz Khan, played out a 68-run knock in the 3rd innings, accumulating a 72-run partnership with Yashasvi Jaiswal which helped India post a 500+ target.
“Many new faces and yet England are struggling”, Ganguly takes a brutal dig at Ben Stokes’ side
Even though England’s skipper Ben Stokes believes that his side can overturn the 2-1 deficit to a 3-2 series win, Sourav Ganguly who retired after scoring 11,000 ODI runs, feels England have no chance of recovering and that he will be shocked if India lose now.
“Bazball is good, but it’s difficult for England to be successful in Indian conditions. I will be surprised if India loses the series. Please remember that India are playing without Virat [Kohli], KL [Rahul]. It’s a young team with many new faces, and yet, England are struggling.” – Ganguly concluded.