Retaining faith in the experienced Sanju Samson or fielding teenager Vaibhav Sooryavanshi will be head coach Gautam Gambhir’s biggest headache as India take on a gutsy West Indies side in the opening T20 International in Lucknow on Tuesday.
With a change in coaching personnel from V V S Laxman from the Asian Games to Gambhir, there will certainly be a shift in strategic philosophy even though both coaches believe in batting depth till number 8.
But if one follows Gambhir’s template closely, he doesn’t prefer to play both Samson and Sooryavanshi.
Gambhir also revealed that he has spoken to the young Sooryavanshi and made it clear why he will have to wait for his opportunities in the Indian T20 team.
Despite Sooryavanshi’s recent good form, Gambhir has made it clear in his conversations with the teenager that he is not a guaranteed starter.
‘It was a new experience for me as well. Yes, he was in good form, but I made him understand that sometimes, because of the players who have done well for a long time, he will have to wait for his opportunity,’ the India coach said on JioStar’s Follow the Blues ahead of the five-match T20I series against the West Indies, starting on Tuesday.
‘And there’s one more thing, social media or outside noise doesn’t decide the playing eleven. It depends on who in that dressing room, or who the coach and captain feel can win us the match, or what is the best playing eleven, and who have done well for such a long time.’
Gambhir believes it would be unfair to drop Abhishek or Samson, who played a key role in India’s T20 triumph earlier this year, after a few failures.
‘Because if Vaibhav plays today, then it’s going to be a tough conversation between me and whoever we leave out, whether it’s Abhishek or whether it’s Sanju.
So, we can’t suddenly ignore a combination that has created such an impact over the last one-and-a-half or two years, and after three or four failures, drop them and play a young player who is very talented, who is also in very good form. So, sometimes you will have to wait for your opportunity because we want to create that security in that dressing room.’
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