9 Years Before Wanting Gautam Gambhir To Lead Delhi Daredevils, Ricky Ponting Had Feared For His Inclusion In Nagpur Test

Indian Premier League has made it possible for international rivals to share contrasting relations in different phases of their careers. As quoted by the The Australian, former Australia captain Ricky Ponting had once feared in-form Gautam Gambhir’s selection into the Indian Playing XI for the fourth Border-Gavaskar Trophy match in November 2008. Nine years later in January 2018, the same Ponting wanted Gambhir to lead Delhi Daredevils (now Delhi Capitals) to kick-start his coaching tenure with the franchise.

Gambhir was banned from playing in Nagpur Test because of his actions during the third Test in Delhi. In spite of the aforementioned time span, Ponting got what he wanted on both the occasions. In addition to Gambhir not featuring in that match, he also agreed to lead Daredevils in IPL 2018.

Ricky Ponting Had Feared Gautam Gambhir’s Inclusion For Nagpur Test

For those unversed, Gambhir was fined 65% of his match fees and was handed a one-match ban for altercations with former Australia all-rounder Shane Watson at the Feroz Shah Kotla. It all happened during the 51st over of the Indian innings on Day 1. While taking a run, Gambhir elbowed Watson in the process only for their engagement in a verbal battle.

Trailing by 0-1 in the series, Ponting had publicly expressed a concern about India pushing hard to include a “banned” Gambhir in the team. The fear was not surprising as Gambhir was the best batter of the series who also scored an excellent double-century in the previous match.

Gambhir decided to appeal against the ban as he thought that it was not intentional. However, match referee Chris Broad had said that Gambhir was guilty of a Level 2 offense.

Despite Gambhir’s appeal getting rejected, Ponting still feared the left-handed batter’s presence in Nagpur. On the eve of the match, he wasn’t in a great mood at all as he thought the Indian board was trying illicit means to open with Gambhir the next day. Ponting even believed that it could affect cricketing relations between the two nations.

“It’s going to be an awkward situation for me to be put in tomorrow if we went out to do the toss and the guy who has been rubbed out has his name on the team sheet,” Ponting had told The Australian as quoted by The Times Of India.

“We have to be prepared for both. That he is going to play or he isn’t going to play.”

Debutant batter Murali Vijay had replaced Gambhir in the fourth Test which India won by 172 runs. Gambhir, who played a match less than the others, finished as the highest run-scorer of the series with 463 runs coming at an average of 77.16 comprising two centuries and a half-century.

Ricky Ponting Had Wanted Gautam Gambhir To Lead Delhi Daredevils In IPL 2018

Head coach at Mumbai Indians between 2014-2016, Ponting had replaced current Indian head coach Rahul Dravid at Delhi after the latter decided to resolve “Conflict of Interest” allegations by picking India-A and India U-19 teams over an IPL gig.

Clear-cut in his vision from the word go, Ponting had wanted Gambhir to mark a comeback to his home franchise after spending seven years at Kolkata Knight Riders. For a side, which had some talented young Indian players, Ponting had found an experienced Gambhir to be an apt captaincy candidate.

Having not played international cricket for over a year at the time, Gambhir was still a sought-after IPL campaigner on the back of winning two IPL titles in 2012 and 2014. Gambhir, whose base price was INR 2 crore in IPL 2018 auction, was sold to DD for INR 2.80 crore. Before making the winning bid, they had received competition from Rajasthan Royals and Kings XI Punjab (now Punjab Kings) as both the franchises had made an unsuccessful bid each.

“We had a fair bit of thought into that. It is likely now that Gambhir will lead the team next season. We had a conversation with him. He has conveyed to us that he would like to make a comeback to his home Delhi and hopefully lead the team,” Ponting had informed the host broadcaster on the auction day as quoted by Firstpost.

However, a potential fairy tale was not meant to be. Gambhir stepped down as the captain midway through the league stage after a series of low individual scores and bad results in what ended up being his last IPL season as a player. Readers must note that Ponting had experienced the same situation after he relinquished Mumbai’s captaincy midway during IPL 2013.