Rohit credits Dravid for Champions Trophy victory after removal from ODI captaincy under Gambhir: ‘I loved playing with them’

Rohit Sharma, who was recently removed from India’s ODI captaincy, has credited former coach Rahul Dravid for the Champions Trophy 2025 victory, a tournament win which came under new coach Gautam Gambhir in March this year. The 38-year-old Rohit has been replaced by Shuman Gill as India’s new ODI captain as BCCI chief selector Ajit Agarkar revealed that the management felt it was time to move on and hand the captaincy to a new player with two years to go for the 2027 World Cup.

A separate report has claimed that coach Gambhir wanted Rohit removed from the ODI captaincy as the veteran has already retired from the other two formats. Gambhir feared that Rohit continuing as ODI captain could 'disturb' the team culture.

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Rohit reveals how T20 World Cup, Champions Trophy were won

On Tuesday, at an event in Mumbai, Rohit was asked about India bouncing back from the 2023 World Cup final heartbreak and winning the 2024 T20 World Cup and the 2025 Champions Trophy. The former captain said that the two ICC trophy wins under his captaincy were a result of years of hard work, doing things differently and making the whole team believe in the process.

“Look, I love that team, loved playing with them and it’s a journey that we were all into, for many years. It’s not about one year or two years of work. It was about getting into work from many years,” Rohit said during the CEAT Cricket Rating awards.

“We’d come so close of winning that trophy many times but we couldn’t just get over the line. That is where everyone decided that we need to do something different and there’s two (ways) to look at it. There’s always a thought of doing that and then actually going and doing that. It cannot be done by one or two players. We needed everyone to buy into that thought, which was good from everyone,” Rohit said.

Rohit credits Dravid for Champions Trophy victory

Rohit went on to add that the thought process of being able to disassociate themselves from the last victory helped India win the 2025 Champions Trophy, and it was a process that was established under Dravid’s tenure.

“All the guys who took part in that competition (Champions Trophy) got into that thought process of how to win games and how to challenge ourselves and not be complacent and not to take anything for granted,” he said.

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“Those were the qualities that we tried to bring in and we thought it was a good method of just going and doing that repeatedly. Everyone enjoyed that process. Once we got over the line when we won the first game, we completely put that game aside and then started focusing on the next one.

“That was really good from the team and that is something that helped me and Rahul bhai when we were planning for the (2024) T20 World Cup, and then on to the Champions Trophy. We just carried it well.

“In 2023, although we didn’t cross the line in the finals, we set out to do something as a team and everyone did that,” he added.

Rohit’s comments have sparked a debate on social media as fans are speculating that the former India captain was trying to take a dig at Gambhir for removing him as the ODI captain, while a few felt the Mumbaikar was only pointing out the truth.