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Gautam Gambhir defends after India’s 2-0 whitewash by South Africa at Barsapara Stadium, urging deal with Test cricket, accountability, and difficult characters over flamboyant play.
Gautam Gambhir’s India under pressure. (PTI Photo)
Under-fire Gautam Gambhir appeared to be deflecting the criticism after the humiliating 2-0 whitewash against South Africa, with a record-low of a 408-run defeat on the Barsapara Stadium in Guwahati. Twice in his post-series press conference, he mentioned how the team didn’t need ‘flamboyant players’, and the way the collapses were due to players who ‘didn’t have a plan B’ and were adamant about their kind of play.
Although he didn’t take names, some players within the team were particularly criticised for a similar thing over the course of the Guwahati Test. One was stand-in captain Rishabh Pant, who edged a wild slog in the primary innings when India were 105/4, and the opposite was Dhruv Jurel, who took on a pointless pull shot against Marco Jansen to get out for 0 (11) in the identical essay.
“Start prioritizing Test cricket, if we’re really serious about it,” Gambhir said, when asked how India could improve within the format. “Everyone must be a stakeholder. If we wish Test cricket to flourish in India, we’d like a collective effort. Just blaming players or support staff won’t help. And as I said, we are able to’t put things under the carpet. Come white-ball formats, when you get runs there and suddenly forget what you probably did in red-ball cricket, that ought to never occur,” he added, again without taking any names.
“Red-ball cricket requires different skills. And more importantly, it needs tough characters. You don’t need probably the most skillful or flamboyant players; you wish tough characters with limited skills who succeed no matter conditions.”
It was curious because Gambhir began the presser by speaking about how the blame lay with every player, and he wouldn’t put it on anyone specifically. It was more interesting since the team had been built by him, unlike, as he said, the one he had only shortly taken over in last 12 months’s Latest Zealand whitewash.
‘If someone thinks that is how I play, you’ll get collapses’: Gautam Gambhir
Asked whether India’s repeated collapses within the Gambhir era were attributable to mental or technical issues, Gambhir said it was the previous, because some players didn’t know easy methods to play the situation.
“It comes from care — how much you care in regards to the dressing room and the team. Accountability and game situation can’t be taught. Yes, you possibly can discuss skills, work on skills, discuss the mental aspect — but whenever you go in, you have to put the team ahead of yourself. If someone thinks, that is how I play, I don’t have a plan B, you then will get these sorts of collapses.
“Accountability is significant — but greater than that, it’s care. How much you care about Indian cricket and the people within the dressing room. From 95 for 1 to 120 for five — that’s not technical. It’s mental. It’s about how much Test cricket means to all of us. We’d like to maintain eager about what must be done and where we are able to recover. Individually and collectively.”
November 26, 2025, 14:38 IST
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