IPL 2020: Gautam Gambhir slams Dinesh Karthik for leaving KKR captaincy

The IPL franchise Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) are facing a tough time in the 13th edition of the T20 extravaganza. After their defeat against Chennai Super Kings by 6 wickets on October 30 at the Dubai International Cricket Stadium, the chances of them qualifying for the playoffs have become slim. Throughout the tournament, the franchise was seen experimenting with their batting and bowling line-up.

KKR had also handed the captaincy from Dinesh Karthik to England’s World Cup-winning skipper Eoin Morgan to change the team’s fortune in the T20 league. However, the move hasn’t reaped fruitful results for the Knight Riders as they are placed at fifth position with just 6 wins in thirteen games. Halfway through the tournament, the management had revealed that Karthik had stepped down as a captain to focus more on his batting skills.

This reason for leadership change didn’t go well with the former KKR captain Gautam Gambhir who slammed Karthik for his wrong mindset. Giving an example of his own, Gambhir reckoned that when I was facing issues with my batting, I concentrated more on the captaincy instead of leaving my responsibilities.

Gautam Gambhir is not happy with Dinesh Karthik for leaving KKR captaincy

Speaking to cricket.com, Gambhir said, “It just shows the mindset. You left captaincy because you wanted to concentrate on batting, but then it hasn’t worked, so probably sometimes it’s good when you take up responsibilities. What I’ve realized when I was through a worse phase in 2014. I got three ducks in a row when we started the tournament. It was captaincy that helped me that I could get back into form,” the former Indian opener said.

“The reason why because when I was not batting, I was thinking about how to make the team win through my captaincy and the decision making. But when you’re not captaining, you’re thinking even more about your batting,” he further added.

Though KKR still have a chance of making it to the Top 4 in the points tally, it will depend more on how the other franchises including Kings XI Punjab, Rajasthan Royals and Sunrisers Hyderabad perform in their upcoming two fixtures. Along with that, the Knight Riders need to win their upcoming game against Rajasthan Royals on Sunday, November 1 by a big margin to improve their net run rate.