1st Unofficial Test: All Eyes On Sarfaraz Khan, Kuldeep Yadav As India A Take On New Zealand A

Sarfaraz Khan will be aiming to convert his stupendous domestic performances into big runs at the international level when he takes strike for India A in the first unofficial Test against New Zealand A, starting from Thursday. The New Zealand A side includes at least half a dozen of players who have represented the senior national team in some format over the years and would give competition to the home team.

Most of the players in the Indian squad are the ones who played an A series in South Africa late last year and would like to consolidate their positions in the Test team's pecking order.

But no one would get the kind of traction that Sarfaraz is supposed to as he is back at the same venue where he scored a hundred in the Ranji Trophy final a couple of months ago.

While the chosen ones are either proven domestic performers or the likes of Kuldeep Yadav, who would like to get his mojo back having missed out on the red ball domestic season last time.

But in the case of the burly Mumbaikar, the attention would be much more because, after a near 1000-run Ranji Trophy season, he is literally knocking on the men's senior natinal team's doors.

India's next Test assignment is in Bangladesh in December, after the T20 World Cup in Australia.

In that squad, there could be at least one vacant middle order slot, if not two, and Sarfaraz is a serious contender to board the Dhaka-bound flight. A strong indication of that has been given by the selectors, who decided to drop Hanuma Vihari from the India A side, and he will be playing the Duleep Trophy for South Zone, like Shreyas Iyer for the West Zone.

It can be said with some degree of certainty that the national selection committee is still not sanguine whether Vihari and Iyer are