Gautam Gambhir is a legendary cricketer who has several great accomplishments to his name. It's not surprising that he now has a stand named after him at the Arun Jaitley stadium. However, Gambhir isn't fully satisfied with the pace at which things moved on this front.
After the North Stand was declared as Gautam Gambhir Stand, Gambhir answered some questions from reporters. His replies, characteristically, were contentious. When asked about the delay in the stand being named after him, the former India opener took a potshot at the current president of Delhi District Cricket Association (DDCA), popular news show host Rajat Sharma.
"I think the president can answer this question better because earlier I was told that stand will be unveiled during the India versus Australia game (earlier this year), then they said it will be the first game of the IPL, they said the hot weather (a tournament). This was what was told to me in the last six to seven months," Gambhir told PTI.
The former captain of Kolkata Knight Riders, who is known for being feisty and blunt in his opinions, went further than the issue of a stand being named after him and questioned the qualifications of the DDCA selection panel members.
"One thing probably which is absolutely not acceptable is having a selector who has not played for Delhi. Delhi is like Mumbai and Karnataka, we are multiple time Ranji Trophy champions, so you don't expect to have a selector who has never played for Delhi."
This was a direct attack on Vineet Jain, one of the three selectors, alongside Atul Wassan and Anil Bhardwaj. The former left-handed batsman went further and said: "In fact, you have got a junior selector also who has never played for Delhi. I had raised that point when I was a DDCA director but it did not change anything and hurt me a lot. There are many ex-Delhi players who can contribute so much to the game."
Once he was on it, Gambhir didn't hold back his punches. There were other complaints that Gambhir shared with the media.
"We had (court-appointed) administrators running the game for so long and then we had elections and again it is a divided house now. At the end of the day, young cricketers suffer most from all this. You can't work with your ego, it can spoil careers of young and talented players. People in DDCA will come and go but the cricketers should not suffer. All the elected members should work as a team."
It's worth remembering that Gambhir was on very good terms with former DDCA president and senior BJP leader, late Arun Jaitley. Going by his comments, he doesn't think that the current dispensation is doing as good a job as Jaitley did in his day.
