Shastri: Gambhir’s most important task will be to understand his players

NewsThe former India coach says Gambhir has the “tools, experience and goods” for being the head coach

Ravi Shastri believes having Gautam Gambhir as the new India head coach is “refreshing” because he is “contemporary” and has “fresh ideas”.

“He’s contemporary, he just had a great season in the IPL,” Shastri said on Gambhir on the ICC Review. “I think he’s the right age where he’s young, he’ll come with fresh ideas. He knows most of the players, especially in the white-ball format, having been part of teams in the IPL. So I think it’s refreshing.

“And we know with Gautam, he’s a no-nonsense guy. He’ll have his ideas as well. And the good thing for him is he’s got a mature team. He’s got a settled team, a mature team. I think even though you might think you’re mature, you might benefit from some fresh ideas. So I think it’ll be interesting times.”

Gambhir takes over from Rahul Dravid after India’s victorious T20 World Cup campaign, and his first assignment will be the white-ball tour of Sri Lanka that starts with the three T20Is on Saturday in Pallekele.

Gambhir takes over in all formats fresh on the back of an IPL win with Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) – he was team mentor and was credited with rallying the players together, for making Sunil Narine open again with the bat and lifting the confidence of newcomer Harshit Rana, among other things. With the Indian team too, he will have the big task of managing both junior and senior players, across formats.

“Obviously, player management becomes the key as a coach,” Shastri said. “So it’ll be interesting to see how he goes. I think he’s got the tools, he’s got the goods for the job and he’s got the experience.”

Shastri said Gambhir’s “most important task” will be to understand his players as people and their “temperaments”.

“It’s a question of just understanding his players as quickly as possible,” Shastri said. “What their strengths are, what kind of human beings they are and what kind of temperaments do they have. What are their personalities. A lot goes behind the scenes to understand a human being.

“I think that will be his most important task, which I think again should not be a problem because he’s contemporary. He’s seen these guys from the outside, he’s dealt with a lot of guys who might have played with KKR as well and for Lucknow [Super Giants] when he was there.

“And he’s been around the circuit, the moment he finished cricket – and that was not too long ago – and he still is around, plays a lot of the legends cricket as well.”

In Tests, Gambhir’s major assignments will be the five home Tests starting in September (two against Bangladesh and two against New Zealand) followed by five Tests in Australia for the Border Gavaskar Trophy. In the white-ball formats, the ICC trophies he will be eyeing are the Champions Trophy in 2025 and the T20 World Cup in 2026.

Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma and Ravindra Jadeja have retired from T20I cricket, but Shastri did not see that as a problem for India, given the resources waiting on the fringes.

“I think a lot of the players that won this T20 World Cup will still be around two years later,” he said. “You mentioned the three players who were retired, but barring them, I think most of the others will be still fit to be in that T20 World Cup team two years down the line in India.

“So I don’t think there’s much to be done there. In fact, you will get a problem on your hands because you’ll have to choose from the new lot that’s coming and there’s some real exciting talent there.

“So I think it’s the other way around. It’s how do you get those guys in there who are bursting at the [seams] to get it. There’s a queue out there and that will be his biggest challenge, but it’s a good headache when you have that kind of talent.”