Gill, take charge: With the honeymoon period over, India captain must assert himself and own the big decisions

At the crease, Shubman Gill has many qualities that give him a strong chance of succeeding. He sets up classically for a right-hand bat and waits for the ball to come to him. He has every shot in the book, but his game is built on a tight defence.

The batting bit, at least some of the time, must feel like the easy part to Gill. It is every aspiring cricketer’s dream to captain their country. But, as they rise through the ranks, many will realise that the honour is not always worth the trouble. The constant pressure to deliver results may even be bearable, but dealing with what happens off the field is something very few people aspire to.

For starters, Gill has to set the agenda for the squad he wants. To this end, he works with the selectors. They may make some sound plans, but injuries can change everything, even after a player is selected, as happened with Jasprit Bumrah for the Sri Lanka tour.


India are fortunate to have tremendous depth, thanks to the aspirations of millions and a robust domestic structure. In white-ball cricket, they could comfortably field more than one team most of the time. This is not hyperbole, just the sheer talent pool available to choose from.

In Test cricket it’s less simple. India may occasionally be able to pick a strong second eleven, but even in their first choice, some players are irreplaceable. There is no Bumrah equivalent waiting in the wings. In the spin department, Gill is similarly hamstrung. With left-hand batsmen aplenty in the mix, Gill would have desperately liked a quality off spinner in his arsenal. But, for the moment, he is going to have to work with an uncapped 30-year-old and discover how good he is and whether he can do the job at the Test level.

But, assuming for a minute that India still have enough in reserve to assemble a quality squad, Gill then has to contend with picking the best XI for the conditions. In cricket, because the buck stops with the captain, he typically has the final say in picking the playing XI.

But Gill is relatively new to the job — and any honeymoon period if such a thing exists for the Indian captain, is over — and Gautam Gambhir, the coach, is a strong character.

Coaches being very clear about what they want to achieve and how they plan to get there is nothing new. But Gill has taken the job on the back of Rohit Sharma and Virat Kohli, both of whom were very much in charge. They worked closely with the coaches, usually in consultation and agreement.

In Gill’s case, there is still the impression that Gambhir is the most influential voice in the dressing room. Some of this is simply because Gill is soft-spoken. To confuse that for softness would be a mistake. Gill was singular enough to get online in support of the farmers when they agitated, staying true to his roots, something not many other cricketers did.

Gill was bold enough to question the manner in which players were repeatedly getting injured and expressed his frustration at some of his best not being able to string together a sequence of games without needing rest or repair of some kind.

The final step in this forward movement will be for Gill to be crystal clear about the combination he wants in the playing XI, and, at a more granular level, which people he wants to entrust key roles to.

The Sri Lanka Tests are as good a time as any to see how Gill makes this team his own. This is not a case where the eleven picks itself, and some tricky choices lie ahead.

While Gill may have given himself some time to ease into the captaincy before asserting himself, nothing will hasten this process more than a lack of results. On that count, in Test cricket, India have not had it good in the recent past. Every defeat will sting, obviously, but it also goes down on Gill’s report card.

When all is said and done, and years down the road Gill’s captaincy comes up for discussion, nobody is going to remember the context in which the losses were racked up. The numbers will speak for themselves, however unfair that is. And with this being the case, Gill’s best shot is to own his role, take the tough calls even if consensus is not forthcoming. That’s the only way in which he’ll be able to live with himself.