India’s head coach Gautam Gambhir confirmed that Sai Sudharsan will be India’s number three batter for the one-off Test against Afghanistan. On Wednesday, India’s assistant coach Ryan ten Doeschate had revealed they would give a long rope to the number three batter.

Sudharsan amassed 722 runs in 17 matches at an average of 45.75 and a strike rate of 163.02 in IPL 2026 and he would look to carry the same form in the Test match against Afghanistan.

The left-hander has scored 302 runs in six Test matches at an average of 27.45, and thus, he is yet to nail down the number three position after Cheteshwar Pujara’s retirement

Meanwhile, in-form Devdutt Padikkal was another option for India for the number three spot. However, he may have to wait for his chances in the playing XI.

“Sai Sudharsan hasn’t got a fair chance. He played in England. We will give him a longer rope. We can (only) pick 11 (players) and Sai isn’t in bad form. He scored 700 runs in IPL. If we judge Sai on basis of 4-5 games we will never be able to build something,” Gautam Gambhir said during the pre-match press conference.

The one-off Test match between India and Afghanistan will be played at New Chandigarh from Saturday onwards.

India is currently in sixth place in the World Test Championship standings and this will be a crucial game for them.

India Test squad: Shubman Gill (c), Yashasvi Jaiswal, KL Rahul (vc), Sai Sudharsan, Rishabh Pant (wk), Devdutt Padikkal, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Washington Sundar, Kuldeep Yadav, Mohd Siraj, Prasidh Krishna, Manav Suthar, Gurnoor Brar, Harsh Dubey, Dhruv Jurel.