Tough questions for India after two debacles in a row

A second series loss raises more questions than answers as head coach's performance comes under the lens

- Rasesh Mandani

SYDNEY: It doesn't take a lot to get Gautam Gambhir angry. It never has. Even as a player, he was quick to lose his temper and his intensity could often prove to be hard to handle. It didn't necessarily make him a bad player, but his presence in the dressing room often came with caveats.

It was also one of the reasons why many were unsure about him as Team India coach. For starters, he had no real experience. And it is one thing to be a mentor in the Indian Premier League and quite another to handle the best players in India against the best in the world.

Would his confrontational, always-on-attack attitude help? In the short run, it hasn't. India are in a tough space and the results over the last six months have been disappointing, to say the least. They lost the ODI series against Sri Lanka (2-0), then the home Test series against New Zealand (3-0) – the first home series loss in 12 years – and the Border Gavaskar Trophy after losing the series 3-1. Australia beat India in a series for the first time in a decade. This is a sign of things starting to spiral out of control.

So, it wasn't really a surprise that in India's final press conference in Australia on Sunday, head coach Gambhir was an angry man. He was gruff, flippant, not even listening to the entire question before launching into a tirade.

To his credit, he spoke about many things – his views on the future of Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli, the reasons for the series defeat, Jasprit Bumrah, tough men, tough cricket and how he will be the first to accept the team's mistakes. A common refrain through all these answers was: "As simple as it can get."

Then again, maybe the questions are simple because they are so obvious. But the answers, that's a different matter altogether.