That time when Gautam Gambhir dropped HIMSELF for low performance and Declined taking salary

As Gautam Gambhir has decided to leave Rohit Sharma out of playing XI for the final Test against Australia for the ongoing Border-Gavaskar Trophy, it has recreated that time when Gambhir dropped himself from captaincy because of low performance in the IPL.

Gautam Gambhir’s time period as the Indian head coach is going to witness a moment of estimation on January 2 at the Sydney Cricket Ground (SCG), as the national team is going to play in the fifth and final Test of the ongoing Border-Gavaskar Trophy (BGT) 2024-25.

While the Indian head coach Gambhir was one of the main deciders in leaving Rohit out of the playing XI, he set this incident during his own playing days. In the 2018edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL), Gambhir came to Delhi Capitals (Delhi Daredevils at that time) and got named the franchise’s captain.

However, he struggled to make runs, as he had scored 85 runs in six innings and could not bring out expected results for the team. During his tenure, Delhi Capitals won just one of their six matches.

Between the team’s poor results and him struggling himself, Gambhir gave the captaincy to Shreyas Iyer and refused to play any more matches that season. That season also was the last time he played as an IPL player.

“I didn’t make any call to be honest. It wasn’t my decision to drop him. He himself decided to sit out, which was really courageous decision with him being the captain in the previous matches,” Shreyas Iyer said in the media interaction when Gambhir decided to sit out.

“The respect for him has gone really high. It’s really [good to] see when a captain if he’s not playing well, he backs out. Colin [Munro] came in and gave us the desired start,” he added.

According to media reports in 2018, Gambhir had even decided to let go of his salary of Rs. 2.8 crore from Delhi Capitals.