For Gambhir it also meant he became the first person to win a Men’s T20 World Cup as a player (2007) and coach (2026), with the former India batter revealing post-match the key ingredient behind the side’s success.
“The plan was very simple as I am a different kind of character. Every person sees cricket differently. It’s not fair to compare what kind of a team I have made – I always believe that high risk, high reward is the only way to play a T20 format, and you don’t fear to lose a game of cricket to win a game of cricket,” Gambhir said.
“If you start fearing to lose a game of cricket, you will never win. And that’s why, as I said earlier, my ideology with the captain was very simple. We will not play a match of 160-170. I would rather accept that we get all out at 100, but that 150-160 takes you nowhere.
“So if you play high risk, that’s when you make 250 or 260 runs. And there will be days like that and it can come in the future. And they have come. We lost a match against South Africa by 100 runs – but that ideology never changed. That mindset never changed. I never thought, that now let’s play a little subdued. Because after South Africa, all our matches were must-win matches. All were knockout matches. But despite that, if you play that kind of cricket, that’s when you give yourself the best chance to win big tournaments.”
