Afghan spinners 'better than India's'

Ahead of their historic first Test this week, Afghanistan captain Asghar Stanikzai has boldly claimed that his side's spinners are better than star Indian duo Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja.

Afghanistan will become just the 12th nation to play Test cricket when they take on India in Bengaluru from Thursday, with the hosts to be without star skipper Virat Kohli.

While Kohli is on the sidelines, India will be able to call on spinners Jadeja and Ashwin, the world's fourth and fifth-ranked Test bowlers respectively, who have taken more than 400 wickets between them in Tests in Asia at an average of 22.

The Afghans have selected a spin battery of their own led by star leggie Rashid Khan, gun teenager Mujeeb Ur Rahman and veteran allrounder Mohammad Nabi and Stanikzai has claimed his bowlers can more than match the proven Indian duo.

"The whole world knows that (we have good spinners like) Rashid Khan, Mujeeb, Nabi, Rahmat (Shah), Zahir (Khan)," Stanikzai told ESPN.

"In Afghanistan, the brilliant thing is that a lot of the young talent that is coming through are spinners, because they all follow Rashid, they follow Nabi, so because of that our spin department is very strong from below.

"In my opinion, we have good spinners, better spinners than India."

Rashid, the ICC's top-ranked T20 bowler and No.2 in ODIs, is a superstar in white-ball cricket but has played just four first-class matches, albeit with a stunning record of 35 wickets in just four games.

Seventeen-year-old Mujeeb, meanwhile, who starred in this year's Indian Premier League, is yet to play any cricket at first-class level and left-armer Zahir has played just seven matches, boasting a staggering record of 34 wickets at 13.

Afghanistan's Trinidadian coach Phil Simmons played down talk that his spinners were better than their opponents, but backed Rashid to overcome his inexperience at first-class level.

"I don't know about better than India," Simmons said.

"I think Rashid is at a different level now, if he keeps improving, but we haven't seen him that much in Test cricket. Well, we haven't seen him at all in Test cricket, but in four-day cricket we haven't seen him that much. So it's a new frontier for him.

"I'm sure he will conquer it, but whether he will conquer it in the first game, we'll have to see."

The one-off Test gets underway at the Chinnaswamy Stadium on Thursday.

India: Ajinkya Rahane (c), Shikhar Dhawan, M Vijay, KL Rahul, Cheteshwar Pujara, Karun Nair, Dinesh Karthik (wk), R Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja, Kuldeep Yadav, Umesh Yadav, Mohammed Shami, Hardik Pandya, Ishant Sharma, Shardul Thakur

Afghanistan: Asghar Stanikzai (c), Mohammad Shahzad (wk), Javed Ahmadi, Ihsanullah Jannat, Rahmat Shah, Nasir Jamal, Hashmatullah Shahidi, Afsar Zazai, Mohammad Nabi, Rashid Khan, Zahir Khan, Hamza Hotak, Syed Ahmad Sherzad, Yamin Ahmadzai, Wafadar Momand, Mujeeb ur Rahman