Former India spinner Harbhajan Singh stated that Team India made a huge mistake by not including veteran batters like Ajinkya Rahane and Cheteshwar Pujara from their Test squads against South Africa. However, Team India failed to do well in either inning as they lost the Centurion Test by an innings and 32 runs against South Africa as well. He also claimed that they do not have a better red-ball batter than Pujara at the moment.

Speaking in a video on his YouTube channel, Harbhajan Singh said about Cheteshwar Pujara: “Didn’t select Ajinkya Rahane and have left Cheteshwar Pujara out for no reason. These are the two players who have scored runs everywhere. If you look at the previous record Pujara has the same contribution as Kohli had. I don’t understand why Pujara has been left out, we still don’t have a better batter than Pujara in Test cricket. He plays slowly but he saves you, because of him India won Test in Australia and England.”

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However, Harbhajan Singh also praised the efforts of KL Rahul and Virat Kohli with the bat but also feels that overall they just failed to step up.

“In three days India for a single moment never looked in the game. They scored 245 runs after losing the toss in the first innings and it was all thanks to KL Rahul. He played a fantastic knock which propelled India’s score to 245. In the second innings, India could only score 131 and if you remove Virat Kohli’s contribution then it would have been more difficult. The match was decided on India’s performance in the first innings,” he concluded.