5 vice-captains who could have made good captains

3. Adam Gilchrist

Gilchrist led Deccan Chargers from a wooden spoon finish in 2008 to the title in 2009

The explosive wicketkeeper succeeded in doing what Allan Border, Mark Taylor and Steve Waugh failed to do. Leading Australia in the absence of regular skipper Ricky Ponting, Adam Gilchrist won Australia a series in India, a task which Steve Waugh called the final frontier for Australia’s perennial poor performance in India despite being world beaters.

However, those two riveting Tests made one-third of Gilchrist’s captaincy career as he led the team in a total of 6 Tests, winning 4 of them. But the fact that those two victories were crafted against Indians whose batting order boasted of names like Tendulkar, Sehwag, Dravid, Ganguly and Laxman in Indian conditions tell a lot about Gilchrist’s leadership abilities.

He was the perfect deputy to Ricky Ponting and had it not been for Ponting, he might have led Australia in more Tests and more victories. He gave an able demonstration of his captaincy once again when he won the Indian Premier League at the fag end of his career in 2009 in South Africa.