Indian cricket has been marred by controversies in the last few months including the drama that unfolded on stripping Virat Kohli from leadership duties. Former cricketer Gautam Gambhir believes the episode could have been sorted internally without making it public.
Incidentally, the last couple of months have been difficult for the 33-year-old cricketer. He stepped down as captain in the shortest format after ICC T20 World Cup 2021 before he was being stripped of the leadership duties from the one-dayers ahead of the South Africa series.
Kohli addressed a press conference before leaving for South Africa and asserted that he was communicated about the decision during the team selection and there was no prior information. This led to a direct contradiction as the selectors had stated that Kohli was well aware of the developments.
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The turmoil and the 1-2 defeat in the Test against South Africa led to Virat Kohli relinquishing his duties in the Test cricket as well. Giving his verdict on the same, Gautam Gambhir stressed that it could have been solved internally. Speaking to Times Now, the Lucknow Super Giants mentor said:
“I think this could’ve been sorted behind closed doors as well. It was an internal battle. It was a great TRP for a lot of new channels but that’s fine. If you go to the depth of it, the matter can easily be solved. It’s not that big of an issue.”
Gautam Gambhir added:
“Honestly, I don’t see any controversy which was created. Talking about captaincy, I think Virat should have continued as red-ball captain. But for white-ball captaincy, once he decided to let go of T20I captaincy, he had to let go of ODI captaincy as well. The BCCI and the selectors were right from the white-ball point of view. But it was Virat’s personal decision to step down from Test captaincy, which he should have continued.”
Meanwhile, Virat Kohli will be next seen in action during the upcoming limited-overs series against West Indies where India are scheduled to play three ODIs followed by the same number of T20Is.
