Mumbai batter Sarfaraz Khan failed to find a place in the India A team against South Africa. Sarfaraz, who performed well with the Indian Test team under the leadership of Rohit Sharma, has now been left out even for the tour games.
The lack of selection baffled many cricket fans in India, as they questioned the absence of the Mumbai batter, who never really looked out of touch in his recent outings. In fact, Sarfaraz, in his last two first-class games, has scores of 92 (vs ENG Lions), 42 and 32 (vs J&K), which perhaps should have been good enough to make it to the A team.
Sarfaraz was earlier dropped from the Indian Test side after their disastrous home series against New Zealand. Sarfaraz had scored a riveting 150 in the opening Test match in Bengaluru but ended up fizzling out in the rest of the series.
The batter was dropped from the side due to fitness issues. He trimmed himself down with intense training during the Indian Premier League 2025 season in the hope of a call-back to the Indian team. However, a return call never came.
Chief of the national selection committee, Ajit Agarkar, explained the snub ahead of the Test series against England, stating that Karun Nair had leapfrogged the batter after scoring a truckload of runs in the Ranji season.
After Karun Nair’s tenure with the Indian team came to an end following the England tour, murmurs about Sarfaraz’s return began once again. However, the call-back never came. As questions on Sarfaraz’s exclusion mounted, Agarkar explained that the batter had a quadricep injury and was not in contention for the side.
However, despite playing in the first round of the Ranji Trophy, Sarfaraz did not earn a call-back to the A team.
India Announce A Squad vs South Africa
Rishabh Pant returned to red-ball cricket after a long injury layoff, as India announced their A team for the South Africa series. South Africa are set to travel to India in November for a 2-match series, before which they will play two warm-up games against the India A side.
India A squad for the 1st four-day match: Rishabh Pant (captain) (wicketkeeper), Ayush Mhatre, N Jagdeesan (wicketkeeper), Sai Sudharsan (vice-captain), Devdutt Padikkal, Rajat Patidar, Harsh Dubey, Tanush Kotian, Manav Suthar, Anshul Kamboj, Yash Thakur, Ayush Badoni, Saransh Jain.
India A squad for the 2nd four-day match: Rishabh Pant (captain) (wicketkeeper), KL Rahul, Dhruv Jurel (wicketkeeper), Sai Sudharsan (vice-captain), Devdutt Padikkal, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Harsh Dubey, Tanush Kotian, Manav Suthar, Khaleel Ahmed, Gurnoor Brar, Abhimanyu Easwaran, Prasidh Krishna, Mohammed Siraj, Akash Deep.
