India vs Afghanistan 2018: 5 Players To Watch Out For
14th June will be a historic day for Afghanistan as they will become the 12th nation to play test cricket. Their growth in the International cricket has been phenomenal and they have proved their calibre in the last few years.
Having achieved relative success in the T20 and ODI format, this is the big break for the Afghanistan players. The rise of Rashid Khan, Mohammad Nabi, and Mohammad Shahzad has been excellent in the last couple of years.
Afghanistan will make their Test debut against the number one Test team and they cannot ask for a better way to make their Test debut. The historic Test game between India and Afghanistan will be played in Bangalore from June 14.
Though the Twenty20 format is not a parameter to judge a team's performance whether a team will perform or not in the Test format, the way Afghanistan has performed in the limited-overs format, they will give a strong performance in the longest format of the game.
On the other hand, it is the best opportunity for the Indian team to prepare themselves for the tough tour of England. India will play the Test game without their regular skipper Virat Kohli and main bowlers Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Jasprit Bumrah and Mohammad Shami.
However, India will not take them lightly, knowing Afghanistan's current form. Here we take a look at the few players whose performance will be key to their team's success.
#5 KL Rahul
He has always been someone who has been a part of the test squad as a backup opener for Shikhar Dhawan and Murali Vijay.
But he is capable of much more than that. He started his career as the pure Test player. Though he is a good opener, he should bat in the middle-order as the team requires some stability in the lower middle-order.
The Indian opener KL Rahul has been in tremendous form since the start of the 11th edition of Indian Premier League. Rahul, who had a successful IPL season with Kings XI Punjab, will be full of confidence facing the likes of Rashid Khan and Mujeeb Ur Rahman.
Having already faced his KXIP team-mate Mujeeb Ur Rahman in the nets, it will not be a problem for Rahul to face Mujeeb in the Test game. Rahul has scored 1458 runs in 23 Test matches that he played at a good average of 40.02.