Former Kolkata Knight Riders captain Gautam Gambhir doesn’t think that KKR will get benefited from the midseason captaincy change. On Friday, Dinesh Karthik handed over the captaincy of KKR to the 2019 World Cup-winning captain Eoin Morgan in the ongoing Indian Premier League (IPL) 2020.
Gautam Gambhir believes that KKR should have appointed Eoin Morgan as the captain from the very start of the tournament. According to him, the change in captaincy in the middle of the tournament might affect performances.
“Cricket is not about relationships, it’s about performances and honestly, I don’t think Morgan can change a lot of things. He could’ve changed a lot of things had he captained from the start of the tournament. No one changes during the middle of the tournament. It’s nice to have a good relationship between the coach and the captain,” Gambhir said on Star Sports.
Should have done it at the start of the competition: Gautam Gambhir
Like others, Gautam Gambhir was also surprised by Dinesh Karthik’s decision to step down from the captaincy although the franchise is in the top four in the points table.
“Li’ll surprised. He’s obviously leading KKR for the last 2 and a half years. You don’t do it in the middle of the season. KKR is not in that bad a position that someone needs to change a captain, so yeah little bit surprised.
Gautam Gambhir reiterated that Eoin Morgan should have captained KKR from the beginning of the tournament while it was right to put pressure on Karthik.
“If KKR wanted to make this change, they should have done it at the start of the competition. If you are talking so much about a World Cup-winning captain being there in your team puts pressure on someone like Dinesh Karthik then why not just give it to Morgan straightaway, why put so much pressure on Karthik?
“My point is, it sounds very good when someone says that I want to concentrate on my batting but the truth is, you start getting fillers from the management whether they are happy or not, so it’s very unfortunate,” Gambhir said.
According to KKR official release, Dinesh Karthik had stepped down from the captaincy because he wanted to concentrate on his batting. The wicketkeeper-batsman had led KKR in seven matches this season. Out of which, they registered victory in four matches.
Meanwhile, Morgan, on Friday, first time led KKR against Mumbai Indians. However, they faced a big defeat in that match by eight wickets.