Suryakumar Yadav termed it the “Indian mentality” when a scribe wanted to draw a parallel of his team’s success with the “Australian mentality” of Ricky Ponting’s 2007 team, which had made winning a habit in white-ball cricket.
Even in an unpredictable format like T20 cricket, the Surya-led side has had an 80 per cent success rate since the 2024 World Cup. Surya described the fundamental shift in their approach as the “Indian mentality”.
“This is the Indian mentality. We have been playing some good brand of cricket for the last two-three years, but we have changed our thinking,” Surya said during the pre-tournament captains’ media interaction at the Cricket Centre on Thursday.
“Earlier, we used to play bilateral (series) differently than the ICC tournaments, but now, be it an ICC event (or the) Asia Cup or even a bilateral (match), we try to play in the same manner. This is why, when we went to play the 2024 T20 World Cup, it did not feel any different. It felt like we had been playing this way for an entire year. Even now, the kind of cricket we have been playing for the last year, we will try to play the same way (in the T20 World Cup). And if we play well, the result will also be on our side.”
India have won consecutive ICC trophies in men’s cricket — the T20 World Cup
in 2024 and the 2025 Champions Trophy.
This “Indian mentality” is largely responsible for India enjoying an unprecedented favourites tag going into yet another ICC event. History, though, is against them — no team has won a T20 World Cup at home and none has successfully defended it.
The India T20 captain was his usual jovial self during the half-hour session and credited head coach Gautam Gambhir for the transformation.
“It has been a wonderful journey since he (Gambhir) took over. The main thing is the atmosphere that he has created in the dressing room... that it’s a team game... that personal milestones should be kept aside and team goals are more important,” he said.
“For example, in the last match in Thiruvananthapuram (against New Zealand), Ishan Kishan was in his 90s and he completed his hundred with a six. That is one thing he (Gambhir) is trying in the dressing room, keeping the personal milestones away and focusing on what’s the team’s goal and then working towards it.”
Surya also didn’t wish to read much into the dew factor, which has been highlighted by Mahendra Singh Dhoni as a deterrent to the team’s success.
“We should rather take the dew factor out of the game now and we should focus on playing good cricket. The game has advanced, you prepare for the dew factor. It all boils down to how you prepare,” he said.
