“I’m a big believer that the coach is something you travel in to get to and from the game.” The great, late Shane Warne wasn’t a huge fan of organised coaching, nor of ‘bootcamp’ John Buchanan’s methods when the latter was the Australian coach.

The coach is a key element in the formative years of any aspiring sportsperson in any discipline. That’s when techniques and methodologies are instilled, forming the foundation for what transpires later. At the professional level, ‘coach’ is bit of a misnomer; in individual sports, but especially more so in team dynamics, the coach is more of a player-manager, his job as much to provide the ideal environment for his wards to flourish as to massage and assuage inflated and hurt egos.

It's difficult to imagine Gautam Gambhir doing the latter – tending to egos, that is. He is, however, an excellent man-manager, never mind his widely-publicised image as a grumpy, unyielding individual. As mentor at first Lucknow Super Giants and then Kolkata Knight Riders, Gambhir has mastered the art of putting the player first, a quality that will be even more on call during his three-and-a-half-year stint as India’s head coach.

Gambhir’s long tenure has got off to the perfect start imaginable, with victory in his very first outing, in the Twenty20 International series in Sri Lanka. The 2-0 score line can’t be put down to beginner’s luck because India have played the better cricket, but clearly, Gambhir’s bigger challenges are in the future.

Starting, perhaps, later this week with the three-match One-Day International series in Colombo. The T20I squad is largely a young and relatively inexperienced unit, and Gambhir had the advantage of having struck up a grand relationship with skipper Suryakumar Yadav during the latter’s stint with Kolkata Knight Riders when the left-handed opener was the captain. For the ODIs, India will welcome back seasoned hands Rohit Sharma, the current ODI and Test skipper, as well as Virat Kohli and KL Rahul, who have both led the country in all three formats in the past. What kind of rapport Gambhir is able to strike with them will be crucial to how things unfurl over the next several months.

Gambhir has played alongside Kohli for Delhi and India, and shared an Indian dressing-room with Rohit, which should help the move forward from the Rahul Dravid coaching phase. Gambhir and Kohli, the former an MP from East Delhi and the latter an out-and-out West Delhi boy, have had numerous runs-ins in the past in the IPL, but from all indications, they buried the hatchet long before Gambhir was even in the running for the head coach’s post. Rohit is laidback and chill, hardly finding the need to waste energy in confrontation unless seriously provoked, so it can be safely surmised that the two senior pros will be in Gambhir’s corner because eventually, the collective goal will be to drive Indian cricket forward.

Upon prodding during his first press conference as head coach, Gambhir spoke at length of his relationship with Kohli, insisting that all was well between them. There is no reason to disbelieve that; both are intensely passionate individuals whose bust-ups have come when they have been on opposite sides of the fence. Now occupying the same dressing room, it’s hard to see them not pulling in the same direction; Gambhir isn’t unaware of the skills Kohli brings to the table, while the latter, no longer the most powerful man in Indian cricket like he was until 2021, knows that Gambhir has his, and his team’s, best interests at heart.

Can Gambhir make Rohit and Kohli better batters than they already are? There is no answer – easy or otherwise – to this question. Gambhir obviously can’t bat for them, and there is little this seasoned duo doesn’t know about batting. Gambhir’s task will be to maximise their abilities, but at this stage of their respective careers, neither right-hander needs any external motivation.

Neither Rohit nor the man he replaced as captain has played an ODI since 19 November 2023, one of the darkest days in Indian cricket when Australia consigned them to a shattering loss in the final of the World Cup. Eight months is a long time in international sport, and it is inevitable that even these two worthies will have gathered some rust. Their efforts to shake off some of that rust were baulked by the weather upon their arrival in Colombo on Monday, but while it might take them a little while to switch back to 50-over mode, it won’t be long before they start firing on all cylinders. Now, what a sight that will be.

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