- By Namrata Vijay
- Wed, 26 Nov 2025 11:51 AM (IST)
- Source:JND
IND vs SA 2nd Test: India head coach Gautam Gambhir gave a fiery pep talk to the Indian team ahead of the fifth day of the ongoing Test match in Guwahati. Gambhir looked agitated as he was seen motivating the players to put up a fight despite them facing a mammoth target.
He, along with the bowling coach Morne Morkel and Sitanshu Kotak, was seen encouraging the Rishabh Pant-led side.
Gambhir has been under pressure for the last few weeks, with a lot of people urging the BCCI to rethink the position as the head coach of the Test team. In his guidance, the team has lost 4 home Test matches of the six that they have played.
His aggressive reaction came a day after the Protea coach, Shukri Conrad, had revealed that they batted longer than needed as they wanted the host to be on the gravel.
The host started the fifth day at 27/2 and needed 522 runs more to win. Kuldeep Yadav, who was the night watchman along with Sai Sudharsan, came into bat as they wanted to bat the whole day and play for a draw and score the important WTC points.
Not a single Test team has been able to chase more than 418 as the hosts were unlikely to chase the mammoth target on the last day, where the spinners were able to get assistance.
CAN INDIA SECURE A DRAW?
Playing for a tie on the last day in India is never easy. The host has played more than 500 balls in their last innings to win a Test in overseas conditions more than 10 times, but has done so just 5 times at home. The last time that they had done so was in 2001, against England.
Ravindra Jadeja has admitted that a tie in Guwahati will be “as good as a win” for the host, who doesn't have any chance of chasing this target.
“We will have to play well, session by session. If we start well tomorrow and don’t lose wickets in the first session, then obviously the bowlers will feel pressure that they have to get us out. And for us, that will be a win-win situation. If we play through the whole day tomorrow, then for us it will be as good as a win,” he said.
The host have failed to go past 220 in their last three innings in the ongoing Test series. In the series opener, they were skittled out for 189 and 93 runs.
In the ongoing match, the host's batters lacked consistency as they scored just 201, whereas the visitors had scored 489 runs in their first innings. Besides Yashasvi Jaisswal and Washington Sundar, none of the other batters batted for long on day 3. Rishabh Pant and Dhruv Jurel gifted their wickets freely.
And then in the second innings, openers Yashasvi Jaiswal and KL Rahul got out cheaply.