India’s rather contrasting results in white-ball and red-ball cricket since Gautam Gambhir took over as head coach has led to some suggesting that it might be time for the team to consider having different coaches for the formats. Former India spinner Harbhajan Singh, who was also a long time teammate of Gambhir with the national team, feels that there doesn’t seem to be a need for India to switch to the model for now but they should consider it if the need arises later.
“It is not that easy to become a coach of India. To be a coach, you have to travel with the team for a whole year and keep yourself involved in the game. You have to be more engaged because there are multiple team selections, and you also need to focus on match results,” said Harbhajan on ANI.
Harbhajan said that whether the coaching responsibilities need to be split or not might be dictated by future results. “In India, it is our tradition that if the team plays well, everyone is quiet, but as soon as the team plays poorly, we get on top of the coach,” Harbhajan said.
“Gautam Gambhir does not go there to play. When he was playing, he played well. He played very well for India. Everyone needs to be patient. If you feel you need to split the coaching, such as adopting a policy of one white ball and one red ball, then there is no need to do so for now. But over time, if needed, you should definitely do it. There is nothing wrong with that,” he added.
The suggestion of split coaching is something that irked Gambhir. Under him, India have won the ICC Champions Trophy and have maintained their extraordinary run of series wins in T20Is. However, it was also under him that India were stunningly whitewashed 3-0 by New Zealand last year, ending the team’s record-breaking winning run in home Test series in rather spectacular fashion. While India then bounced back somewhat by drawing 2-2 in a five-match Test series and thrashing West Indies 2-0 at home, they ended up being whitewashed 2-0 by South Africa, making it the second home Test series they had lost in less than a year after having lost none between 2013 and 2025.
Gambhir had launched a tirade after India beat South Africa in the subsequent ODI series, in which he spoke about suggestions for India to implement split-coaching. “All the discussions about wickets, all the discussions-I don’t know what all things were said. And people who have nothing to do with cricket, said things. An IPL team owner also wrote about split coaching. So this is a surprising thing. It is very important for people to stay in their domain. Because if we don’t go into someone’s domain, then they also don’t have any right to come into our domain,” said Gambhir.