Pressure from Yuvraj Singh? Gautam Gambhir reveals why Abhishek Sharma was not dropped despite poor form

The Indian team management had shown a lot of faith in Abhishek Sharma during the bad phase. The opener’s bat remained silent for most parts of the T20 World Cup 2026. Speaking exclusively to India Today’s associate channel Aaj Tak, Team India head coach Gautam Gambhir explained why he trusts Sharma.

Abhishek Sharma returned to his infamous form on the biggest occasion of the tournament. In the final match against New Zealand, the left-handed batsman played a quick half-century. The opening pair of Abhishek and Sanju Samson took Team India close to 100 runs in record time. Without the support of the team management, the Punjab-born player will not be able to perform well in the summit clash.

Gautam Gambhir told why he kept faith in Abhishek Sharma

Gambhir said that he selected the player not on the basis of expectations but on the basis of trust. He has faith and belief in the batsman, even when he recorded three consecutive ducks out.

Gautam Gambhir said, “Look, you pick players on the basis of trust and confidence, not on the basis of expectation. If you select someone on the basis of trust and confidence, you cannot snatch him after four or five matches. But if you select someone only on the basis of expectation, you can lose that hope very quickly.”

The head coach further said that if Abhishek played an inning of 20 runs in 20 balls, it would cause a lot of loss to the team. Since he was losing wickets frequently, it did not harm the team’s momentum. Therefore, as a coach, Gambhir was not as extreme as many critics.

Actually, the head coach is not completely unhappy with Sharma’s poor form.

Gautam Gambhir said, “People from outside can only see Abhishek’s runs. But if you ask me as a coach, there was no match where Abhishek scored 20 runs in 20 balls. This kind of innings hurts the team more than getting out while trying to play aggressively.”

“So the simple message for them was: if you are not scoring runs, go into the next match and play even more aggressively rather than going into your shell”, he added.

Gautam Gambhir talked about Sanju Samson

As an example, the former cricketer mentioned Sanju Samson. Samson was struggling to score runs ahead of the T20 World Cup 2026, when Team India was up against New Zealand. Despite back-to-back tremendous innings, he played through the series before the management dropped him from the playing eleven. When Samson came back into the team again, he scored runs for fun and was eventually named the best player of the tournament.

Gautam Gambhir said, “If you have watched the New Zealand series, Sanju was not scoring runs. But the way he batted in the World Cup, I think it is a dream for any cricketer. And in fact, it was the other way around for Abhishek Sharma. This is the nature of the T20 format. People judge players by the number of runs they score, but the team management judges them by the impact they make.”

Abhishek Sharma’s batting statistics in T20 World Cup 2026: :

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