Gautam Gambhir pleased with his recent domestic showing

Gambhir scored a brilliant 127 in the Ranji semi-final against Bengal.

Gautam Gambhir | Getty

Out of favour India opener Gautam Gambhir is having a very good time in domestic cricket for Delhi this year. In the ongoing Ranji Trophy season thus far, Gambhir has scored 632 runs in 8 first-class games with 3 centuries and 3 fifties.

Delhi team led by Rishabh Pant annihilated Bengal by an innings and 26 runs in the first semi-final at the Maharashtra Cricket Association Stadium, Pune on Tuesday (December 19). Gambhir scored a magnificent 127 in the all-important knockout match. No wonder, he is pretty satisfied with his showing in crucial games.

“It has been satisfying (season). You want to put your hands up and perform in crucial games for your team. That’s what the team expects you to do as well. Scoring runs makes me happy. It keeps me motivated. Winning a game of cricket is equally important to me,” Gambhir was quoted by India Today as saying.

Gambhir – the ex-skipper of Delhi played the entire 2017-18 Ranji Trophy season under the leadership of Ishant Sharma and Rishabh Pant. On being asked about the same, the southpaw clarified that captaining the entire season gets a little too hectic and hence he decided to pass the baton.

“My job is to score runs and score as many as I can and try and win a game of cricket for my team. Sometimes I feel I have done enough. Captaining the entire season is a very long time. It is not like the IPL where you just finish in two months. Captaining day in and day out can be very tiring as well. So I thought it is time someone else does it,” Gambhir elaborated.

The veteran Delhi opener also expressed his concerns over the current format of domestic cricket in India. Gambhir said that today’s budding batsmen do not know how to bat out an entire day to save or win matches.

“Some of the youngsters do not even know how to bat out the entire day, especially on a day five track, win a game outright. Because in a four-day game, most of the time the last day has been a dead rubber. If it is a five-day game, you always have an opportunity to make a comeback in the second innings as well, so the bowlers will be motivated. It will be challenging for the batters as well,” opined Gambhir.

“Look at county cricket. County games are 18 four-day games. There I can understand you can’t take it to five days because that’s going to be very challenging. Sheffield Shield is more than 10 games. In India you play six games, 24 days of first class cricket, which is nothing. You don’t prepare yourself the whole year just to play 24 days. And if you played one innings per (match), literally you play six or seven innings in a season which is absolutely ridiculous,” he concluded.

Delhi will lock horns with Vidarbha in the Ranji final which will be played at Holkar Cricket Stadium, Indore from December 29 to January 2.

 
 

By Salman Anjum - 22 Dec, 2017

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