'We believe in his class and we believe he will come good.'
Shubman Gill has been a "bit too tight" since his T20 comeback as he has been trying to "justify" his place in the side but the Indian team management wants him to free up and play like he does in the IPL, assistant coach Ryan ten Doeschate has said.
Gill was brought back into the T20 setup with the Asia Cup in September after he led India to two famous Test wins in the drawn five-match series in England. He replaced Sanju Samson at the top but runs have not flown from his bat, raising questions ahead of the T20 World Cup at home in February-March.
After the loss in the second T20I against South Africa here on Thursday, ten Doeschate said Gill needed to loosen up a bit in the shortest format.
"Taking on the captaincy the way he did in England and how well he led and how much pride he took in that performance, I think an element of that carried over into what he wanted to do in the T20 side," said the assistant coach.
"So if anything, he was too caring and maybe a little bit too tight. Like I said, towards the back end of Australia, the talks were around freeing up a little bit more, trying to relinquish that responsibility. (It was) certainly in that capacity where you feel like it is all about you and you really need to justify your place in the team.
"We don't want him to do that. We want him to play as freely as he does during IPL seasons. We believe in his class and we believe he will come good, and exactly the same with Surya (captain Suryakumar Yadav who has also had an extended lean run)," added ten Doeschate.
The former Netherlands all-rounder firmly backed Suryakumar, who has not been able to find consistency since taking over as captain last year.
"Surya again is such quality and we have high expectations of the players. If you are going to be India's number three, there is pressure on you to score runs.
"There has been a fairly long string of form now where he hasn't got the scores we like. But in isolation, we are certainly not worried about it. Batting at three again, the job we want from him is to go out there and attack.
"Again, he is someone I also thought had a lightbulb moment in Australia. I thought he has been batting really nicely leading into this series as well. Like I said, two games we are not worried about and we are confident that he will come good," said ten Doeschate.
India's bowlers conceded 213 runs in good batting conditions with the pace duo of Arshdeep Singh and Jasprit Bumrah having an off day, leaking 54 and 45 runs in their four overs respectively. Arshdeep was guilty of bowling as many as seven wides in the 11th over after being slapped for a six down the ground by Quinton de Kock.
"I think the bowlers have had a poor night tonight, a bad day at the office, so to speak. We have already had a quick chat around it there. And to be quite frank, I thought we blinked a little bit early tonight.
"That first ball after the break for six (Arshdeep's 11th over), and I thought we went away from our plans too quickly. And again, we don't mind guys trying, but you have got your plans and are you executing the plans? And we probably missed on both of those tonight, which is something we want to avoid (in Dharamsala)," said ten Doeschate.
On Axar batting at five in the series opener and number three on Thursday, the coach added: "Again, we are trying things combination-wise. We have got eight or nine games now before the World Cup. And I guess, being quite frank, we found ourselves being 35 for three more times than we would have liked in the last couple of months.
"So it is just an exploration into how we can extend the batting, the link between the openers and the guys who want to come in and smash it around, maybe when things do get a little bit easier."