Former Indian Test opener Aakash Chopra praised Washington Sundar’s knock in the ongoing one-off Test match against Afghanistan at New Chandigarh. Sundar scored an impressive knock of 52 runs off 68 balls with the help of five fours and one six to help India strengthen their grip on the match.

This was the sixth Test fifty for the left-hander as he batted at the top of his game. Sundar added 54 runs with debutant Manav Suthar and then stitched 30 and 24-run partnerships with Mohammed Siraj and Kuldeep Yadav respectively.

Sundar remained unbeaten as Gill decided to declare after India posted a mammoth total of 564-8 on the board.

“He is actually a proper batter. He is a top-order batter, and that’s why Gautam probably got tempted once to bat him at No. 3. That was the Kolkata Test match, but he has a century to his name, and that too came in difficult circumstances in terms of the context of the game,” Aakash Chopra said on Star Sports.

Chopra added that Sundar is technically very compact and run-scoring isn’t going to be challenging for him if he keeps playing consistently in the red-ball format.

“He is technically extremely compact, and he just continues to score runs. Until he keeps playing this format, he will keep scoring runs like this. This is not his challenge at all. He will only get praised here,” the former India opener observed.

On the other hand, the renowned commentator reckons Sundar’s challenge will be with the ball, when he tries to fill the big shoes of former spinner Ravichandran Ashwin.

“His challenge will be how he bowls when he tries to fill Ravichandran Ashwin’s shoes. He will run ahead of him in batting. He is better-skilled than him, and he has that upside,” he said.

“The ceiling is really high, but his real test is bowling. Washington Sundar, as a Test all-rounder, as a batter who can bowl, is outstanding, no doubt, but the challenge will come now in bowling,” Chopra stated.

Sundar went wicketless after bowling four overs on the second day of the Test.