Sarfaraz Khan To Amol Muzumdar, 5 Most Unlucky Indian Cricketers

Indian cricket has seen so much of talent take centerstage and shine bright. But there have been many who were as good as a Tendulkar, Zaheer or Dravid but never got the chance or a long run with the team. We take a look at some of them in this gallery.

Sarfaraz Khan is in news for not getting selected for the tour of West Indies. The Mumbai batter has scored 3505 runs in 37 FC matches. 2566 of these runs have come in last 3 Ranji Trophy seasons. His average of 79.65 in first class cricket yet selectors feel he is not fit enough to play for India as yet.

Priyank Panchal might become the next Muzumdar. After piling on runs, season after season, he finds himself sided by the selectors. Panchal was called for the India tour of South Africa but did not play a single match. He is 33 now and is looking at retirement without featureing for a single match for India. In first-class cricket, he has smashed 7901 runs in 111 matches.  

11,167 runs in 171 first-class matches but never picked to play for India ever. He was born in a wrong era where Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid, VVS Laxman were present in the Test batting lineup. Muzumdar, despite making tons of runs in almost every Ranji season, never for the India call-up.

Unlike Muzumdar, Badani represented India in 44 matches. However, he could have got a longer rope than what he got. Badani played in the middle order only when the likes of Yuvraj Singh or Mohammad Kaif were absent. The impact of Kaif and Yuvi was so much that Badani featured in the playing 11 only intermittently before getting dropped.

An average Indian cricket team fan may have never heard of Jalaj Saxena. Not many know that he has won the prestigious BCCI award, Lala Amarnath award, which is given to the best all-rounder by BCCI, a total of 3 times. Jalaj has played in 133 first class matches, picking 410 wickets and scoring 6567 runs. Yet he has never ever got a national call-up.