Ignored India batter Sarfaraz Khan sent a clear message of intent to the selectors by playing a phenomenal knock for Mumbai in their clash against Goa in the Vijay Hazare Trophy. The 28-year-old has been in great form when it comes to the domestic circuit and delivered for Mumbai once again. His name may very well be in contention for India's upcoming ODI series against New Zealand.
After being invited to bat first, Mumbai got off to a rocky start as Angkrish Raghuvanshi departed in the eighth over for 11 runs. A decent 70-run stand between Yashasvi Jaiswal and Musheer Khan pushed the bowlers a little on the back-foot, but the former failed to play a big knock and got dismissed by Darshan Misal for 46.
Sarfaraz's stunning knock
Next came Sarfaraz, who played in an explosive fashion right from the get-go. While his brother Musheer assisted him well by batting sensibly, the former went all out and smacked the opposing bowlers all around the stadium. Mumbai's run-rate increased drastically after Sarfaraz's arrival to the crease. Though the 93-run stand between the brothers would come to an end after Musheer returned to the pavilion for 60, Sarfaraz was in no mood to stop.
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The batter continued to terrorize opposing bowlers despite not getting a lot of support from the other end. Sarfaraz eventually went on to bring up his century after facing just 56 deliveries as Mumbai cruised towards the 300-run mark. Even after reaching triple figures, the batter continued to play fearlessly and kept on scoring boundaries for fun. He would eventually be dismissed in the 42nd over by Misal for 157 runs from 75 deliveries. Though Goa finally managed to get rid of the danger man, the damage was already done as Mumbai stood at 340/6 with eight overs still to go.
Mumbai post humongous total
Sarfaraz's fiery innings included 9 boundaries and 14 towering sixes and had helped in getting Mumbai to a formidable total. However, the team wasn't done yet as a half-century from Hardik Tamore and impactful cameos from Shams Mulani (22) and Tanush Kotian (23*) got them to a gigantic total of 444/8 by the end of 50 overs. The Goa batters have a mountain task at their hands of chasing down the huge target of 445 runs.