India’s assistant coach Ryan ten Doeschate has revealed the number three batter will be given a bit of rope, indicating the team will stick with Sai Sudharsan at one drop for the one-off Test match against Afghanistan. 

In-form Devdutt Padikkal is also one of the strong contenders for the number three spot. Meanwhile, both left-handers were in prime form in the recently concluded IPL, and it would be interesting to note the team’s decision.

While Padikkal scored 464 runs in 15 innings of IPL 2026 at an average of 33.14 and a strike rate of 168.72, Sudharsan amassed 722 runs in 17 matches at an average of 45.75 and a strike rate of 163.02.

Sudharsan has scored 302 runs in six Test matches at an average of 27.45, and thus, he is yet to nail down the number three position after Cheteshwar Pujara’s retirement.

Ryan ten Doeschate said in the pre-match press conference, “Dev [Devdutt Padikkal] comes in with a ton of runs in domestic cricket across all the formats, and obviously Sai’s got a nice IPL with Gujarat, so they’re both in good form. I think whoever plays, they’ll be given a bit of rope. It’s quite difficult with one Test match now, and then we don’t play a Test match for another two months, and then you play two Test matches, and then you don’t play for a while.

“So we need to factor that in, but I think the main point around is we want to make a decision and then trust that person to grow into the role and ideally quickly because where we find ourselves in the WTC table, it’s obviously we don’t have time to bet in now. It’s probably something we could have done better leading up to this, is nailing down that number 3 spot,” he added.

The one-off Test match between India and Afghanistan will be played at New Chandigarh from Saturday onwards.