Can Sarfaraz Khan become VVS Laxman minus his Rahul Dravid in Virat Kohli?

Such is the embarrassment of riches at India’s disposal that not even 200 runs and three half-centuries in one’s first five Test innings can guarantee a sustained run.

India’s Virat Kohli and Sarfaraz Khan run between the wickets on the third day of the first Test vs New Zealand

Sarfaraz Khan and prolific run-making have been extended bedfellows for a long time now. On the cusp of turning 27, the stocky right-hander has been on the first-class landscape for a decade, averaging a truly staggering 69.09 in 51 games. Not only does he make big runs, he makes them quickly and with chutzpah and cheekiness, with confidence and character.

It took a mountain of runs and for the stars to align for him to finally break the door open to Test selection in February. As if to make up for lost time, he biffed 62 and 68 not out against England in his first two knocks, the former only ended by a run out when Ravindra Jadeja, on 99, called him through for a single in Rajkot and then left him for dead.

After a lean outing in Ranchi, Sarfaraz lashed 56 in Dharamsala in March, but when Virat Kohli and KL Rahul returned to action at the start of the international home calendar last month in Chennai, Sarfaraz was forced to warm the bench. Between the end of the Test series against Bangladesh and the start of a new one against New Zealand, he played for Mumbai in the Irani Cup game in Lucknow, hammering an unbeaten 222 – a hundred for himself, he said, and another for his younger brother Musheer, who was forced out of the said game against Rest of India after a road accident.

Even that double ton would not have sufficed had Shubman Gill not been ruled out of the Bengaluru outing against the Kiwis with a stiff neck. Sarfaraz had enough notice to target match readiness – not that he needed it – but it didn’t do him any good when, at No. 4 for India for the first time, he was dismissed without scoring on Thursday.

Sarfaraz’s was one of five ducks in India’s first-innings 46, but he wasn’t going to be denied a second time around. On Friday, with India trailing by 356 on the first count, he shared a rollicking third-wicket stand of 136 with Virat Kohli, also a ‘blobber’ in the first dig, which ended off the last ball of the day when the former captain was dismissed by Glenn Phillips.

Can Sarfaraz pull off a VVS Laxman?

The spirit of Dravid and Laxman was being invoked in various quarters until the last-ball tremor. In 2001 against Australia at the Eden Gardens, the two right-handers went through the whole of the fourth day unseparated and added 376 for the fifth wicket, an effort largely responsible for India overturning a 274-run deficit into a 171-run heist. Would Kohli and Sarfaraz reprise those heroics? Would lightning strike twice, 23 and a half years apart?

No, and no, as it turned out. Kohli will take no further batting part in this match. It’s all up to Sarfaraz now, with KL Rahul and Rishabh Pant (who limped off on Thursday with a knee injury but knocked for a bit on the Chinnaswamy outfield at teatime on Friday afternoon) and the all-rounders for company. But Sarfaraz is the key, even though he is the least experienced player in the XI.

What he does remarkably well is push the scoring along with his unique brand of batting that no coach is likely to recommend to any of his wards. His style is his own, unorthodox but clearly highly effective, instilled and honed and fine-tuned by his all-seeing father Naushad, his coach and mentor and guide and influencer, all rolled in one.

Does Sarfaraz have what it takes to get the rest to bat around him? Without a doubt. He has reiterated his insatiable appetite for tall edifices time and again. He isn’t easily satisfied, he relishes making runs and he seems, at least from the outside, to be remarkably insulated from the pressure that is an inevitable companion of international sport. In many ways, he and Pant are kindred spirits, the feisty right-hander and the insouciant left-hander at once both the present and future of Indian batting.

Maybe Sarfaraz-Pant will do a Laxman-Dravid. Maybe they won’t, because the odds of that slice of history repeating itself are very high. Maybe individually or collectively, they have something else in store, something equally memorable, equally special. Like Pant but without the same volume of work at the highest level, Sarfaraz is a special player with a liking for the extraordinary. Saturday will be as good a time as any for him to step out of the shadows and bask in luxuriant sunlight.