Former Team India coach Sandeep Patil backed current India head coach Gautam Gambhir against growing criticism ahead of the side’s Test tour of Sri Lanka. Team India recently faced consecutive white-ball series losses to Ireland and England before the T20I series win over Zimbabwe as well.

Talking about this, Patil told TOI: “The Sri Lanka tour is crucial for everyone; why only Gambhir? If Gambhir has failed to perform, so have the players. It is not right to pick on one guy. We were not able to play spinners and lost the home series against New Zealand because they came prepared. They practised on turning wickets. Whereas our team was practising at the CoE on good tracks.”

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Meanwhile, former Indian opener Lalchand Rajput also defended head coach Gautam Gambhir at a time when questions have been raised about the latter’s position at the helm as well.

“I still feel that as a coach, there will be ups and downs. You can’t be winning all the time. The Indian team is going through a rebuilding process. And when the team is going through it, you have to give more time to the players and the coach. Greats like Rohit and Kohli have quit two formats, while India have a new T20 captain in Shreyas Iyer and have tried several new players in the T20 series in England,” he concluded.