India domestic stalwart Faiz Fazal is one of those unfortunate players who despite showing supreme consistency in the first-class circuit never really got the kind of attention from national selectors he deserved.
Though, in his thirties, Faiz did get the opportunity to make his international debut for Team India against Zimbabwe in 2016. He played one ODI game in which he smashed unbeaten 55 but after that never played any international game.
Recently, the opening batsman and Ranji Trophy-winning skipper with Vidarbha dropped his opinion on the best leaders in Test cricket at present. During an interview for Sports Tiger’s show ‘Off the Field’, when Faiz was asked to rate the best captain in the world, he chose Virat Kohli and Tim Paine.
“I am a fan of Tim Paine; he is very good as a Test captain. Virat is also very good in Tests,” the 34-year-old said.
Faiz was also quizzed about him not getting a call to the national team despite scoring a half-century in his debut match. Faiz said that the competition in Team India is extremely tough and he still hopes to get a call in the Test team.
“The competition in Team India is very tight; I feel very fortunate that I played for India because that was the aim to play for the country. Nothing can be compared with that. But I still aim to play for the Test team. But, yes, I feel disappointed that I could not continue my place in the Indian team.”
“The game itself is my motivation, and I love playing cricket at any stage. That’s why even in the off-season, unfortunately, this season, I could not go but I always travel to the UK and plays the premier league there,” the Nagpur-born added.
Faiz further shared his experience of being a captain of Vidarbha.
“I love captaining Vidarbha. I have been very fortunate to get some amazing cricketers in my side. Even when I was leading in the Duleep Trophy, I had some amazing cricketers in that team as well. You cannot teach a lot; it comes naturally,” Faiz concluded.
Faiz has exceptional domestic records to his name. He has played 125 FC matches, 95 List-A games and 66 T20s, in which the left-handed batsman has accumulated 8404, 2996, and 1273 runs, respectively.
