5 star cricketers from New Zealand's previous India tour who won't feature this time

India made short work of the Kiwis during their last tour here

The Blackcaps are back in India after a duration of 4 years to lock horns with the home side in the longest format of the game. The first of 3 Tests starts in Kanpur on 22^nd September and both teams will be looking to outwit each other over the next one month or so.

Back in 2012, though, it was the Indians who came up trumps with relative ease as they registered a clean sweep in a 2-Test series. While they inflicted an innings defeat over the tourists in the 1^st Test at Hyderabad, New Zealand managed to put up a fight in the 2^nd one before conceding the match by 5 wickets.

The Test squads for both the hosts and the visitors have certainly undergone quite a few changes in the past 4 years and a number of faces who played in 2012 are missing. Some of the less prominent names include players like Daniel Flynn, Chris Martin, James Franklin, Jeetan Patel, Pragyan Ojha, Piyush Chawla and Subramaniam Badrinath.

Among other absentees, Kiwi bowler Tim Southee was forced to pull out due to injury, whereas Gautam Gambhir has been struggling to get back into the Indian team.

Apart from these players, there are a few superstars who were part of the previous series but will not be seen in action this time.

Here are 5 such star cricketers who will be missed during the upcoming India-New Zealand series:

#5 Zaheer Khan

Zaheer Khan retired from the game last year

One of the big players from India’s squad in 2012 who will not be around this time is left-arm pacer Zaheer Khan. The Mumbai cricketer, who played his last Test back in 2014, decided to call time on his highly successful career late last year.

Zaheer’s performance when New Zealand came touring 4 years ago, though, did not match up to the high standards that he set for himself. He was able to manage just 3 wickets in 4 innings at an average nearing 60 and best inning figures of 2 for 83.

The current Indian team has a bunch of talented fast bowlers but none of them has been able to fill Zaheer Khan’s shoes as the leader of the pace attack so far.