India, March 9 -- Milestone's don't matter, trophies do. High risk, high reward.

These are tenets on which Gautam Gambhir built India's class of 2026 that crushed New Zealand in the final at Ahmedabad. To guide a squad towards defending a world title can sometimes be trickier than channelising them towards a cause.

When Rahul Dravid stayed on for the 2024 T20 World Cup, he and the team had an obvious goal - to overcome the heartbreak of 2023 ODI World Cup final. That Gambhir was able to shift the goalpost towards playing a more modern brand of cricket from the previous title and achieve it is credit to his coaching philosophy. This was evident in his past title success in the IPL as captain and mentor, which landed him the India job.

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