India have been whitewashed twice in a Test series at home under Gautam Gambhir.
With Gambhir at the helm, India have won seven, lost 10 and drew two of their 19 Tests so far, which includes a couple of clean sweeps against New Zealand (0-3) and South Africa (0-2) at home.
The team also conceded the Border-Gavaskar Trophy 1-3 in Australia. The only Test series wins under Gambhir's tenure have come against Bangladesh and the West Indies at home.
After the recent debacle against South Africa, calls for Gambhir’s sacking as Test coach have grown louder. A report also claimed that the BCCI has informally approached VVS Laxman to check if he would be interested in coaching the red-ball side.
Meanwhile, former England spinner Monty Panesar has offered a suggestion to Gautam Gambhir, asking him to coach a Ranji Trophy side to better understand the demands of managing a red-ball team.
"Gautam Gambhir is a good coach in white-ball cricket because he has been successful. He could become the Ranji Trophy coach, and he should talk to the coaches who have coached in the Ranji Trophy about how you build a team in red ball cricket. Right now, the Indian team is weak in Test cricket. This is the reality. It's not that strong. It will take time. When you retire three big players, it becomes difficult to keep the remaining players ready," Panesar said while speaking to ANI.
Earlier last week, news agency PTI reported that Laxman was approached by the BCCI for Test coaching duties after India faced a whitewash against South Africa in November. However, the batting legend declined the offer, saying he is happy being the chief of BCCI Centre of Excellence (CoE) in Bengaluru.
The rumours, though, was refuted by the BCCI secretary Devajit Saikia. "This is totally incorrect news going on. This is totally speculative news. Some very reputed news agencies are also flashing the news. There is no truth to it. BCCI straight away denies. People can think all they want, but BCCI has not taken any steps. This is somebody's figment of imagination; there is no truth in it, and I cannot say anything except that this is factually incorrect and baseless news," Saikia told ANI on Sunday.