Rahul Dravid and Rohit Sharma can take Indian cricket forward: Gambhir

Former India opener Gautam Gambhir is hopeful that the team's drought in ICC events can come to an end during new head coach Rahul Dravid's tenure.

The Men in Blue haven't won a major ICC tournament ever since lifting the 2013 Champions Trophy.

Gambhir's comments came after the Virat Kohli-led side suffered an early exit from T20 World Cup 2021.

The former cricketer further said that opener Rohit Sharma is the right man to take over as captain of the T20 side. Kohli is leading India in T20Is for the last time on Monday against Namibia.

"Looking forward to it (Dravid's tenure as coach). India will have a new captain as well and I hope Rohit Sharma gets it because 5 IPL titles, what more do you want from someone? The most successful captain in the history of the IPL and hopefully he and Rahul Dravid can take Indian cricket forward.

"Probably can win an ICC tournament as well. It's been a long time now, it's been 14-15 years we haven't won a T20 tournament," Gambhir told Star Sports.


Gambhir said Dravid and Rohit should work on creating a template that enables them to play like England. "Hopefully, Rohit and Rahul can take Indian cricket forward and probably can create a template, the way they want to go about in the T20 format. I hope they go about it the same (way) England goes (about it) because you have got the ability to do it," Gambhir added.

"Sometimes, if you ask a team like New Zealand to do it, they might not be able to do it because they have not got enough firepower but with people like Rohit Sharma, KL Rahul, Virat Kohli and Hardik Pandya, they have the ability to be fearless.

"The responsibility will not only be on Rahul Dravid and whoever the new captain is but the experts, the media and the selectors to let them go out and play that way. it's easy to say standing here that we should play that way but it's important to back them even if they fail or don't perform. We have got to realise that all of us need to support that template," he added - IANS