Rajat Patidar vs Sarfaraz Khan - first-class cricket record and stats

Rajat Patidar got his maiden Test call-up for India as Virat Kohli's replacement in the squad for the first two games against England as he was coming off scores of 151 and 111 for India A against the Lions

Patidar, who has a first-class average of 45.97, has 4000 runs to his name in red-ball cricket in 93 innings of 55 matches

Patidar, who has been playing first-class cricket since 2015, recently made his ODI debut for India against South Africa and has been pushing his case in the red-ball format as well in the last couple of years

In Ranji Trophy, Patidar has played 50 matches and has 3493 runs to his name in 86 innings with a highest score of 196 at an average of 43.12 with nine centuries and 22 fifties

The man who Patidar pipped to the national team was Sarfaraz Khan, who has been batting at a different level in red-ball cricket since 2020.

Sarfaraz, who had scores of 96 and 55 in the two games against England Lions, has been averaging 122, 154 and 91 in the last three Ranji Trophy seasons

Overall in first-class cricket, Sarfaraz averages 68.20 scoring 3,751 runs in 65 innings in 44 matches

Out of 3,751 runs, Sarfaraz has scored 3002 runs in Ranji Trophy Trophy averaging 81 in 45 innings, with a highest score of 301* with 11 centuries and seven fifties

Even tough Sarfaraz Khan clearly has better overall numbers than Patidar with a difference of almost 23 on average, the latter has been in better form and also has the IPL numbers and fitness backing him