“I Don’t Understand This Thought Process…” Ravi Shastri Slams Gambhir’s Selection Ideas Against South Africa

Ravi Shastri has strongly criticised Indian men’s head coach Gautam Gambhir for his poor selection choices in the ongoing two-Test series against South Africa. Shastri, one of India’s most successful coaches, said he has been trying to understand the thought process behind Gambhir’s decisions but has not been able to make sense of them.

Shastri’s criticism focused on India’s new obsession with all-rounders in Test cricket. Since Gambhir took charge last year, all-rounders like Nitish Kumar Reddy and Harshit Rana have grown in importance, while specialist batters like Sarfaraz Khan have been pushed aside.

In the South Africa series, India picked three spin all-rounders and even promoted one of them, Washington Sundar, to number three by dropping specialist batter Sai Sudharsan. After losing the first Test by 30 runs, India made a few changes in the second Test. They brought back Sudharsan to replace the injured Shubman Gill, but still depended heavily on all-rounders in the lower order, with Nitish Kumar Reddy taking Axar Patel’s place.

As Sudharsan returned to number three, Sundar moved back down to number eight.

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Shastri Questions Gambhir’s Selection Calls

“Just doesn’t make sense,” Shastri said on air during the second Test. “I don’t understand the thought process there. When they look back at the series, some of the selections… I’m still trying to understand what they were thinking. In Kolkata, one of the spinners (Sundar) bowled only one over. They could have picked another specialist batsman.

“Here again, Washington batted at three in the last Test and could have easily batted at four now that you already had a number three. He is not a number eight; he is far better than that,” he added.

Different Approach from Shastri and Dravid

Gautam Gambhir’s ideas are very different from Shastri and even his successor, Rahul Dravid. Both former coaches backed an aggressive Test style with five specialist batters, an attacking wicketkeeper, and five specialist bowlers. For them, the batting skills of Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja were a bonus, not the main plan.

Gambhir, however, is the only Indian coach to be whitewashed in a three-Test home series. On Monday, South Africa pushed India to 122/7 in the second innings while defending 489, putting huge pressure on both Rishabh Pant and Gambhir.