In his newly-released book, former mental conditioning coach, Paddy Upton wrote that former Indian opener, Gautam Gambhir was “mentally the most insecure, negative and pessimistic” but that did not stop him from becoming one of the most successful batsmen of his generation. Interestingly, the southpaw did not find the assertions hurtful.

Gambhir has now turned into a politician, said that he is confident that there is “no sinful intention in Upton’s views as he is a nice man and in any case his insecurities are well documented”. In his reply, Gautam said, “I wanted myself and Indian team to be the best in the world. That’s why I was not satisfied even after scoring 100 as it has been mentioned in Paddy’s book. I see nothing wrong there. As a driven individual, I have tried to raise the bar for myself alone.”

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In his book ‘The Barefoot Coach’, Upton gave a lot of insights about the mental toughness of elite sportspersons and how they react to situations.

He wrote, “I did some of my best and least effective mental conditioning work with Gautam Gambhir, the International Test Cricketer of the Year’ in 2009. I worked with him up until that time but I had little to do with him being named world’s best cricketer.”

Upton recalled how the Gambhir would be in “agony” even after scoring a century and stressing more on the mistakes he might have made. Moreover, Upton wrote that no matter what he and then coach Gary Kirsten did the southpaw opener was “negative and pessimistic.”

Former coach wrote, “Using the popular notion of mental toughness, he was one of the weakest and mentally most insecure people I have worked with. But at the same time, he was undoubtedly one of the best and most determined and successful Test batsmen in the world. Something he would prove yet again in the 2011 World Cup final.”

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According to Upton, former captain MS Dhoni has “incredible emotional control”.

Talking about Dhoni’s emotional control, Upton wrote, “I would go as far as to say, with the greatest respect for MS the man and the Cricketer, that it is not emotional control but the lack of access to emotions. MS is not wired as an emotional type. It’s almost as if he doesn’t have them; a performance-enhancing gift from birth.”