"We had too many gentlemen" - When a former India captain quipped about not having enough sledgers in the team

Sledging is something that has been rather common in the Indian cricket team over the last few years. During the recently concluded Border-Gavaskar Trophy in Australia, many verbal exchanges were witnessed between the two sides. Players like Virat Kohli and Mohammed Siraj seem to thrive on aggression that's directed at the opposition through both words and actions.

Things were rather different in the 2000s when Sourav Ganguly was the captain of the Indian team. While 'Dada' himself was open to having a few words with the opposition, he didn't find support from too many other players barring someone like Harbhajan Singh when it came to sledging.

While speaking to Mayanti Langer during an interaction in 2019, Ganguly quipped that he had too many gentlemen in the team and hence it was a tough job for India to sledge the opposition. He had jokingly commented:

“It was very hard with that team because we had too many gentlemen. If you ask Rahul Dravid to do that, he’ll come back and say ‘No no no, that’s not the right way to play.’ You ask VVS Laxman to do that, he’ll say ‘I’m concentrating on my batting.’

"And if you tell Sachin to do it, he will stand at mid-on and tell the mid-wicket fielder to sledge Steve Waugh and himself not do it. There were a lot of issues in that team. The only ones holding the Indian flag were Harbhajan Singh and Sourav Ganguly,“ the former India captain added.

Ganguly is credited by many experts as the leader who brought Indian cricket back on track after the 2000 match-fixing scandal. Under him, the Men in Blue finished runners-up in the 2003 World Cup in South Africa. The Bengal legend is also credited for backing youngsters like Virender Sehwag, Harbhajan Singh, Yuvraj Singh and Zaheer Khan, who went on to become match-winners for the team.

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Sourav Ganguly's record as India captain

Ganguly captained India in 49 Test matches from 2000 to 2005, winning 21 and losing 13, while 15 matches ended in draws. In ODIs, he led the Men in Blue in 146 matches, winning 76 and losing 65, while five games produced no results.

Overall, Ganguly played 113 Tests and scored 7,212 runs at an average of 42.17, with 16 hundreds and 35 fifties. He featured in 311 ODIs, scoring 11,363 runs at an average of 41.02, with 22 tons and 72 half-centuries.