Another ICC event, another slump, and another heartbreak, seems that India has made it a habit now of making a hash of affairs just one or two steps away from that finish line and the fans are extremely displeased with this. Year after year, things are falling apart and all the Indian players and coaches have come up with are excuses, excuses that aren’t good enough to try and instill hope in the heart of the fans. Somehow this entire habit of making all the right noises and then dissipating in the face of pressure is turning into a pattern.
With all said and done, what exactly follows suit? Is there a new coach or a new captain or anything new that can change the face of the Indian team? How about a point made about a certain man who led India to glory in two World Cup finals, helped KKR to lift two IPLs, and in their very first rodeo in IPL, ushered Lucknow Super Giants emphatically to the playoffs?
Why are we saying this? Well, let’s look at the reasons, and here are five of them that make Gautam Gambhir a perfect man for the job.
#1 A fierce advocate of young guns
If there is one man who has embraced the youth of the nation, it is Gautam Gambhir. Right from the very time he would hand over the Player of the Match award to Virat Kohli, to the very point where he would all guns blazing just because one of his young team members was criticized, Gautam Gambhir promotes youth like none other. With India standing on the cusp of a historic overhaul that is witnessing the twilight of the big guns while the talks get louder to introduce the fierce and the young souls into the side, Gautam Gambhir would be the perfect man to dovetail them as a unit, be the stick when they need it and be the protector when someone threatens them.
#2 A man who knows to win big games
Gautam Gambhir is someone who knows very well to win matches and that too under the pump. Just when in 2007, India was starting to curl themselves back in against Pakistan in the grand finale, it was Gautam Gambhir who would step up and rock India’s arch-rivals like none other. Fast forward the clock by 4 years and when India was teetering along the fringes of madness with Sehwag and Sachin back in the hut, it was Gautam Gambhir who would step up in the face of unfathomable pressure before he would rock the shores of Wankhede with a knock that would become immortal. Somehow, India’s problems don’t manifest in the group stages or the prelims. They are nice and fine and they come out all guns blazing like none other. But just when the knock-outs come knocking, they surrender as if they have been held at gunpoint. That is why it is so crucial to have a man who knows to step up just when his team needs him more.
#3 Has the courage to call a spade a spade
Back in the times of Ravi Shastri, there was a culture in the Indian cricket team about no matter who was the star act or who was turning heads like none other, there was one villain and that was Shastri himself. His word would be final and no one would dare to question that decision. Rahul Dravid is undoubtedly a technical giant. But just because you are a cricketing icon, doesn’t necessarily mean that you will also be a good coach. Not questioning the credibility of Dravid, somehow India needs someone at the helm who can tell them what was wrong instead of sugarcoating it in a layer of sweetness. When you play the sport, you need to know where you are going wrong and where you can improve. You may be the best player in the world and yet somehow Sachin Tendulkar observed very minutely what his coaches had to say. This line has blurred now in the Indian cricket team and that line needs to be drawn again. Hence, comes Gauti.
#4 Protects his team like a family
May it be a young Virat Kohli or a Naveen ul Haq, when Gautam Gambhir steps up in any particular capacity for a team, he ensures the fact that he is making it his own family. Like the way a lion protects his own pride, he would stride out like none other and face all the vitriol if needs to be and still stand in support of his team member. But all of this isn’t just blind enough from him. He does it after ensuring the fact that he is protecting someone who is right and hasn’t done a mistake. It is like that elder brother who would scold his younger siblings and yet would love them so much that a team never feels like a unit but a family.
#5 Points out the necessary wrongdoings
Recently in an interview, Gautam Gambhir pointed out that more than all this social media show, India’s youngsters should focus on the game a lot more. All the rising stars have got a very well-maintained social media presence but in the games, it is not as effusive as their social media handles. Well, he had a very closer observation before he came to this conclusion. Is he right? Well, let’s just talk about cricketers who are somehow coming up with very picky captions when they fail to rack up the heights but what one is forgetting is that the team needs them more on the field. This is what Gautam Gambhir very clearly pointed out and somehow the results are evident. So you pull off evil and Gautam Gambhir will chase you down, but not to cane you, just to make you understand where you are exactly going wrong.
