Why Gautam Gambhir's focus on domestic cricket after Australia defeat was just hollow words

It’s not just Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli and other members of the Indian team who are facing the heat for their poor run in recent months, including in the five-match Test series in Australia that they ended up losing 3-1. Gautam Gambhir hasn’t had it easy ever since he was appointed head coach in July, succeeding Rahul Dravid after the latter signed off from the role by helping India win the T20 World Cup.

After suffering a 0-2 ODI series defeat in Sri Lanka – their first in a bilateral 50-over series against the Lankans in 27 years – followed by a historic 0-3 whitewash against New Zealand at home , India ended up surrendering the Border-Gavaskar Trophy to the Aussies under his watch.

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Gambhir, who had mentored Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) to the Indian Premier League (IPL) title before joining the Indian team last year, faces increased scrutiny because his tenure as coach appears to have co-incided with Rohit Sharma and Co’s sudden decline in performances as well as a divided dressing room.

Speaking to reporters on various topics after India suffered their second consecutive series defeat with a six-wicket loss in the fifth Test in Sydney, ‘GG’ spoke on a host of issues – from Rohit and Virat Kohli’s future and the rise if youngsters such as Nitish Kumar Reddy as well as where things went wrong for them. He even opened up on the importance of playing red-ball cricket, saying those who succeed at the Test level need to play domestic games including in the Ranji Trophy.

“I would always like everyone to play domestic cricket,” Gambhir added. “That is how much importance domestic cricket needs to be given. Not only one game. If they’re available and they have the commitment to play red-ball cricket, everyone should play domestic cricket. As simple as it can get.

“If you don’t give importance to domestic cricket, you will never get the desired players what you want in Test cricket," Gambhir told reporters on Sunday.

How many actually benefited from red-ball experience

For starters, several members of the current team did participate in domestic red-ball cricket recently. That includes 15 players who would go on to either play all or some of the Tests in Australia or warm the bench throughout the tour.

The trio of Rohit, Kohli and Ravichandran Ashwin had declined chief selector Ajit Agarkar’s request for them to participate in the first event of the Indian 2024-25 domestic season, with then-BCCI secretary Jay Shah having personally exempted Ro-Ko from the red-ball tournament. Bumrah too was permitted to give the tournament a miss in order to carefully manage his workload.

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However, only a handful of those players actually performed in the 10 Tests that followed, including against Bangladesh in September. Bumrah and opener Yashasvi Jaiswal have been by far the most consistent with ball and bat respectively, the former not even part of the preceding Duleep Trophy.

Rishabh Pant continued producing handy little knocks down the order even if he was in for some criticism due to his shot selection while Washington Sundar made a grand comeback to the Test format in October and Nitish Kumar Reddy got his Test career off to a dream start.

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A majority of those who either are part of the current Test team or are on the fringes of selection will need to be more regular in domestic red-ball events such as the Ranji Trophy and the Duleep Trophy. However, a two-month long IPL and a cramped international calendar barely leaves Indian cricketers, especially those who are first-choice players, enough breathing space for them to participate in India’s premier First-Class competition.

Are top domestic performers really rewarded?

And even if they do make time for domestic cricket, does it really matter on the longer run? Bengal opener Abhimanyu Easwaran not only scored 309 runs in the Duleep Trophy at an average of 77.25, he also scored 191 for Rest of India in the Irani Cup besides smashing an unbeaten 127 against Uttar Pradesh in his only appearance so far in the ongoing Ranji Trophy.

Yet, the 29-year-old was benched for the entirety of the Australia tour, with the team management opting to stick with the Jaiswal-KL Rahul combination throughout the series except in Melbourne, where skipper Rohit decided to make a return to the top of the order in vain.

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And he wasn’t the only one – Sarfaraz Khan too was relegated to the sidelines throughout the tour despite being a domestic run-machine for Mumbai in recent years and scoring a pair of half-centuries against England on debut and 150 against New Zealand in October.

Now what kind of a message does that send to a player intending to devote time to domestic cricket, especially those who are eyeing a spot in the Test team?