Gautam Gambhir, the current Indian cricket head coach, is under pressure to deliver a series win in the Test series against Sri Lanka. The 44-year-old has been in charge of the team for two years now and doesn’t have a great record in the red-ball format. The current series is also important for the visiting side with WTC points in mind.
South African legend Gary Kirsten, who coached Gambhir for three years, has backed his ward to do well. It is to be noted that Kirsten is the current head coach of Sri Lanka and will be locking horns in a special battle of wits with the former KKR skipper.
Speaking to Times of India, the58-year-old Proteas legend said, “Gautam is a fantastic coach and has had incredible success. He has won the Champions Trophy and T20 World Cup and also had success with Kolkata in the IPL, and his record really speaks for itself. I enjoyed working with him when he was an India player; he was very smart as a cricketer and knew he would succeed as a coach.”
“It was a great three years and was a pleasure to work with some of the Indian players; that dressing room had a lot of skill and I was accepted into the setup, which helped me add value to the team.” In 2011, the former South African opener was in the dugout when MS Dhoni hit a six against his current side to win the ODI World Cup. He then went on to coach his national side for two years and also served as Pakistan’s white-ball coach in 2024.
Gautam Gambhir’s coaching career so far
Former India opener replaced Rahul Dravid after the legendary batter had coached the side to a T20 World Title win in 2024. The same year, Knight Riders had won their third IPL title under Shreyas Iyer’s captaincy with Gautam in the dugout as a mentor. While the team began with a T20I series clean sweep against the Lankans, the side lost the ODI series.
In the same year, Rohit Sharma also saw his team lose 0-3 at home to New Zealand and away to Australia. Last year, Rohit and Virat Kohli retired from the Test format, and Shubman Gill took over the captaincy. Earlier this year, theMen in Blue won the T20 World Cup under Suryakumar Yadav.
The veteran batter was eventually dropped from the team, and Iyer took over as the new skipper. The 31-year-old didn’t enjoy a great start to his captaincy stint as he lost against Ireland and England in the T20I series.