'Creating insecurity will hurt you' - Zaheer Khan warns Gautam Gambhir about his ultra-flexible approach
“You’ve said that you’ve got to have flexibility. Number one and two will be there, but the others are going to be flexible. Now, within that flexibility, some rules also apply," Zaheer Khan said.
Former India speedster Zaheer Khan expressed his concerns regarding Gautam Gambhir's current approach with the Indian team. The India head coach's experiments with the line-up in the ongoing ODI series against England ahead of the Champions Trophy 2025 have not impressed the former pacer. Zaheer has warned his former India teammate against instilling insecurities in the team.
Zaheer's comments come after Shreyas Iyer revealed that he was not part of the original playing XI in the first ODI against England in Nagpur. The Mumbai batter's revelation had left fans as well as experts perplexed as they couldn't understand why a player who had scored more than 500 runs in the 2023 ODI World Cup was not a part of the initial plans.
“You’ve said that you’ve got to have flexibility. Number one and two will be there, but the others are going to be flexible. Now, within that flexibility, some rules also apply. There are certain protocols you have to follow. There’s certain communication that needs to happen, which is going to streamline things. Otherwise, you are creating insecurity, which at some stage will come back and hurt you. You don’t want it to be the case. So, you’ve got to be prepared to deal with that situation,” Zaheer Khan said on Cricbuzz.
“That’s why I said recency bias is something very strong right now. The situation has become dynamic if you have to compare Rahul Dravid’s approach and Gautam Gambhir’s approach. You can say it’s good, bad, or ugly, or you can say how do we adapt? Each individual is a part of this system, be it the senior management or the think tank, be it the players, be it the selectors. They will have to gauge it, and the entire system needs to be streamlined for the wheel to turn properly,” he concluded.
Gambhir lost his first ODI series as the head coach of the Indian team last year against Sri Lanka. However, he has guided the Men in Blue to an unassailable 2-0 lead in the ODI series against England. The third and final ODI is going to be played at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad on Wednesday, February 12.
Download Our App