IPL 2016: Gautam Gambhir reveals Zaheer Khan's greatest strength

The Gautam Gambhir-led Kolkata Knight Riders side suffered its second consecutive loss against the Delhi Daredevils at the Feroz Shah Kotla Stadium in the National Capital Region (NCR), last Saturday.

The Kolkata-based IPL franchise slumped to a 27-run defeat against Zaheer Khan’s men to move a couple of positions below, at number four on the 2016 IPL table.

The Delhi Daredevils side under their new coach, Rahul Dravid, has been consistently performing well as far as this edition’s Indian Premier League is concerned, despite having a pretty slow start to the tournament. The Delhi based-franchise, currently, occupies the number three spot on the 2016 Indian Premier League table with eight points in its kitty from a possible 12.

Although his side lost its second group stage encounter against the Delhi Daredevils by a convincing margin of 27 runs, the Kolkata Knight Riders captain, Gautam Gambhir was gracious enough to heap tons of praise on his Delhi Daredevils counterpart, Zaheer Khan in one of his columns.

Gautam Gambhir wrote, “I remember reading one of Harsha Bhogle’s recent columns in which he suggested Zaheer Khan isn’t too far from becoming the coach of the India team. I agree, although I am not sure whether Zak (Zaheer) will be overall coach or bowling coach. The man is full of knowledge and skill.”

“Plus, he is someone who prefers to do the job (captain or coach his side) by being in the background,” the KKR skipper added.

Gautam Gambhir, further wrote, “Don’t mistake my judgment on the basis of his three wickets against KKR in the last game. I have known Zak for long to declare that his skills with the ball are par excellence.”

“The way he chokes his victims is exemplary. I am not sure if he is keen given his other engagements, but I won’t look too far if he is interested for the coach’s job,” the Delhiite, later, added.

However, the hero of the 2011 ICC World Cup final wasn’t too happy with the performance of his side against the ‘Double D’s’.

“I was disappointed that from 2 for 2 in the first over, Delhi powered to an intimidating 186 in 20 overs. What hurt me most was that they didn’t seem to break a sweat while doing this. Instead, it seemed they had walked into an all-expenses paid dinner buffet and were helping themselves to their fill,” Gambhir wrote in his column.