Australia defeated India by 3-1 in the Border-Gavaskar Trophy 2024-25. Jasprit Bumrah was the best performer, with 32 wickets from five Test matches. The remaining players were inconsistent and the likes of Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma failed completely. Team India’s head coach Gautam Gambhir was also slammed by critics for his failures and some of them predicted his removal.

There were reports that Rohit was dropped from the final Test by Gambhir after the former struggled in three matches. Some of the former players were miffed with Gautam for not keeping Rohit in the team’s Playing XI in Sydney.

Robin Uthappa was asked if Gambhir’s coaching style is similar to Greg Chappell, who almost ended Sourav Ganguly’s career.

Uthappa defended Gambhir. “There is no similarity between Gambhir and Chappell’s coaching style. Gauti is the most straightforward person. He will say on your face and I like people like that. He doesn’t make up things and is blunt,” he said on Lallantop.

Uthappa mentioned that Gambhir has a tough job as he is managing different captains and different teams. “We have different captains. Rohit is leading in Tests and ODIs, while Suryakumar Yadav is the team’s skipper in T20Is. The players are different and Gautam has to make adjustments. He is giving freedom to SKY, who is learning as a captain,” he added.

Robin revealed that Gambhir respects Rohit a lot. “Gambhir had to deal with two different captains in Australia. He started with Bumrah and then Rohit returned. He respects Rohit a lot and they share a good bond.”