Follow UsOver the last month, Shubman Gill has been involved in various on-field feuds, surprising the Indian fans considering his prior good boy image. During the third Test at Lord’s, Gill was involved in one of the biggest on-field feuds in the series when he asked England batter Zak Crawley to ‘grow some ****s’, triggering a debate.
However, Gill failed miserably with the bat during the run chase, getting out for a nine-ball six. In the aftermath of his batting failure at Lord’s, where he scored 16 and 6, former Indian batter Sanjay Manjrekar questioned Gill’s overaggression.
"The thing with Virat Kohli was that he would get even more fired up and become a better batter [if things got nasty]," Manjrekar told ESPNCricinfo. "What disappointed me with Shubman Gill, and that is why I was wondering, where is Shubman Gill heading? Because that seemed like it didn't have the right effect on Shubman Gill the batter.
"He came out looking very tentative and, you know, these days we are privy to the stump mic and we could hear the things being said and there were some personal attacks made. This could be a new experience for Shubman Gill because these days, as you can see, you know, with Indian players, there's mostly friendly reception from a lot of foreign teams. So this was new territory. And he looked tentative and wasn't up for it."
Manjrekar also hinted that Gill might have been showing his aggressive side at Lord’s only because he scored 430 runs in the previous Test in Birmingham.
"And just to extend on that point, if Shubman Gill had that kind of a fiery side to him, we would have seen it a little earlier. You don't have to show it when you're the captain. Or did he show it because he's got this confidence now that he's won a Test match and he's got so many runs?”
While we have seen it time and again with Virat Kohli during his time as India’s Test captain, Manjrekar was left stunned by Gill’s sudden transformation.
“Because with Virat Kohli, you could see that he was ready for a scrap. He was always waiting to get in the thick of things. Even when he wasn't a captain, you could see him coming in there. So that was a trait that we'd seen even before he was captain. With Shubman Gill, I've never seen it before."