Pakistan need a strong coach like Gautam Gambhir, says Danish Kaneria

Heaping praise on Gautam Gambhir, former leg-spinner Danish Kaneria said that Pakistan needed a tough coach like the ex-India opener to steer the team out of the mess that it finds itself in at the moment.

Gambhir was named Team India head coach across formats after Rahul Dravid’s contract came to an end following India’s triumph in the T20 World Cup, and his stint began with a white-ball tour of Sri Lanka, in which the Men in Blue swept the T20I series 3-0, but lost the ODIs 0-2.

Prior to his appointment as as India coach, Gambhir had successsful stints with Lucknow Super Giants and Kolkata Knight Riders in the IPL, serving as mentor on both occasions and helping the latter win their third title earlier this year.

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“Why today other teams are doing so well Why is the Indian team is doing so well? They had a Rahul Dravid who worked with the team very well now. They have Gautam Gambir, a fantastic cricketer and fantastic guy.

“The way he reacts, he tells on the face. He doesn’t go back and do backbiting; he’s on the face straight away. This is how you have to be. You have to be strong, and like a strong person, you have to make the decision on the face, not at the back,” Kaneria told Republic.

Former leg-spinner Kaneria, who remains Pakistan’s fourth-highest Test wicket-taker with 261 scalps, adding that taking things for granted has led to the team’s downfall in recent months.

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“Everything is taken for granted; that’s why the downfall of Pakistan cricket has gone through making captains, changing captain. That will not work. Stick to your captain, stick with him.

“Okay, I have made him the captain for one year. I will ask him. I will ask him to give me an answer after one year. Nobody will touch him you have full support from me, but you need to perform. If you don’t perform, you go out, so that’s the thing you have to make tough decisions. Why, if you don’t make tough decisions, things will not work,” Kaneria added.

Pakistan had appointed former South African opener Gary Kirsten and ex-Australian speedster Jason Gillespie as the head coach for white-ball and red-ball formats respectively in April, with former all-rounder Azhar Mahmood serving as assistant coach in all formats.

However, Pakistan have barely experienced any success across formats since their high-profile appointments. The white-ball teams led by coached by Kirsten and led by star batter Babar Azam lost a four-match T20I series in England 2-0, with two matches getting washed out.

That was followed by an even more humiliating first-round exit in the T20 World Cup in the US and the Caribbean, in which they lost to debutants USA, who qualified for the tournament as hosts.

And under Gillespie’s watch, the Shan Masood-led Test suffered a 0-2 series sweep at the hands of Bangladesh on home soil in what is one of the lowest points in Pakistan’s cricket history.

Read | Pakistan legends rip into Test team after series loss to Bangladesh

Pakistan had a similarly underwhelming run in last year’s ODI World Cup in India, where they lost five out of nine games — including a defeat at the hands of Afghanistan — and failed to reach the semi-finals for the third consecutive edition.

Their poor run in the tournament led to Team Director Mickey Arthur as well as head coach Grant Bradburn and batting coach Andrew Puttick parting ways with the team soon after.