‘Be serious about 20 wickets’: Dinesh Karthik tells Gautam Gambhir after England tour, ‘Now he’s taken control of the team..’

India head coach Gautam Gambhir was under intense scrutiny for his wretched Test results since October 2024 and the defeat in the Lord’s Test last month only intensified criticisms. However, with India making a terrific comeback to draw the Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy 2-all after a stunning six-run win at the Oval earlier this week, Gambhir may have salvaged some of the lament and earned a cushion despite questions raised over the combinations of India’s playing XI across all matches.

Former India wicket-keeper Dinesh Karthik feels the time has come for Gambhir to raise his red-ball coaching credentials by showing faith in selecting teams that believe in picking 20 wickets as much as scoring runs with a deeper batting order.

“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.

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Karthik argued that India’s defensive make-up to the line-up ensured that India did not lose even if they weren’t exactly in a postion to win matches outright.

“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.”

“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’,” Karthik added.

“For this England series, he should be proud of the effort the boys put in.”

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