India’s head coach Gautam Gambhir is a busy man as he heads into the home season with the series against West Indies. The 45-year-old will be managing the dugout during the upcoming ODI series while VVS Laxman takes charge of the Indian side in the Asian Games 2026.
The Men in Blue recently defeated Afghanistan by 3-0 in a T20I series. This was the team’s second successive series win after the 3-0 triumph in Zimbabwe in July. Prior to that, the team lost the T20I bilateral assignment in Ireland and England. The sub-continent team also went down in the ODI series against the Harry Book-led squad.
The critics slammed the Indian National Cricket Team. Gambhir has finally broken his silence. “Which side in the history of cricket has gone unbeaten from one World Cup to win the next? It didn’t take these guys 17 years to win the next World Cup, and it came in just 17 months. One bad series or a few bad games here and there doesn’t make us a bad team,” he told JioStar.
He was pointing to the 2026 title win under Suryakumar Yadav earlier this year.
India’s head coach praises Shreyas Iyer as a captain
Shreyas Iyer has also faced a lot of flak for poor results after taking over the captaincy from Yadav. Gambhir lauded the T20I skipper. “My first experience with Iyer was when I went to KKR in 2024, and he was leading the side back then.
“What I like about Iyer is that he is very flexible. He can also leave his own batting spot and was okay if someone batted ahead of him, which is a very rare quality. That’s when his qualities as a leader were seen, and he is selfless.”
Sanju Samson is another player who has been in the news during the past few years. His opening partnerships with Abhishek Sharma helped the Indian side win a lot of games. He scored over 300 runs to help the Men in Blue win their third T20 World Cup Title.
Kerala’s star player, though, was dropped for a few games in England to make way for young Vaibhav Sooryavanshi. “In my two-year journey as a coach, that was the only night I couldn’t sleep. I said the same to Sanju as well because it was the toughest call of my coaching career to drop someone who won the Player of the Tournament in the World Cup. “