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Guided by head coach Gautam Gambhir, the Indian team went on to win the fifth and final Test of the Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy to ensure that the series was drawn at 2-2. Gambhir had been under fire ahead of the England series because of his abysmal record as head coach in red-ball cricket. Under his guidance, the team has so far recorded just one series victory in four Test series.
Following the Men in Blue's 2-0 series whitewash against Bangladesh, they would themselves suffer a whitewash as New Zealand defeated them 0-3 in a home Test series. Then, the side went on to suffer a 1-3 defeat against Australia in the Border-Gavaskar series as well, knocking them out of the reach of reaching the World Test Championship (WTC) final for the 2023-25 cycle.
Karthik shared his verdict on Gambhir as head coach
Though the series draw against England will be major confidence booster for both Gambhir and the team, former India cricketer Dinesh Karthik believes that there is a lot of work still to be done. Karthik stated that the Indian team need to absolutely focus on clinching all 20 wickets in a Test match.
"Gautam Gambhir had a very ordinary series vs New Zealand at home, goes without saying. He continued to have a poor series against Australia. Now, he has taken control of the team I feel. This is a team handpicked by him, this is a young team. He is the driving force of this team with Shubman," Karthik said on Cricbuzz.
"The one thing that I would think that he can do is, can he almost look at being serious about picking 20 wickets as much as he feels about depth in batting? He's a terrific white-ball coach and the results have been there for us to see. But, in Test cricket, he is also learning on the job. He is a young coach. He's not done too many five-day games, not too much domestic cricket for him to have that volume of experience. We don't know what language he speaks in the dressing room, but they are a bunch of fired up youngsters," he added.
Karthik further remarked that Gambhir will now be responsible whether the Indian team performs well or not. He also went on to praise the Men in Blue for pulling off a heroic series draw against England.
"You could almost argue they picked a team not to lose. He is now getting his way, so he will be responsible for everything that happens in the Indian team. If it does well, credit to him. If it doesn't do well, he should put his hands up and say, ‘we made a mistake'. For this England series, he should be proud of the effort the boys put in," Karthik stated.
Meanwhile, India's next Test assignment will be a two-match home series against West Indies which will commence from October 2. It remains to be seen if Shubman Gill & Co. will finally manage to win their second Test series under Gambhir or not.
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