Former Indian opener Gautam Gambhir has revealed the reason behind India’s ODI series loss against South Africa. The Proteas took an impregnable lead of 2-0 in the three-match series after they won the second ODI by seven wickets.

Gambhir added India should aim to look beyond the fear of losing and play fearlessly in the middle to get the results on their side.

Furthermore, the former Indian opening batter added that one can not play on reputations and cricket matches are won by performing better than the opposition team in the middle.

India’s bowling looked lackluster in the first two ODI matches as they were not able to create any kind of pressure on the opposition. Moreover, India’s middle-order failed to deliver the goods in the first ODI as the team was in a shoo-in position after Shikhar Dhawan and Virat Kohli had added 92 runs for the second wicket.

“Fear of losing. You don’t play on reputations,” said Gambhir in the pre-match show on Star Sports. “Cricket isn’t played on reputations. It is played in the middle. Many people say that India’s top-4 or top-5 is very explosive and very experienced. But the way you play in the middle is the only way to determine results.

“We need to look beyond the fear of losing and the fear of own performance, that ‘I shouldn’t get out, I should score runs’.”

Meanwhile, Gambhir added that the team needs collective effort to win and they need to value the small contributions from their players.

“We need to value small contributions as well, not only from team management but from all perspectives (experts and media). Unless you give value to them, you will only remain stats-driven and numbers-driven. And that doesn’t win you series and ICC tournaments. Only a combination of everything will win you big tournaments,” said Gambhir.

India was not at their best on the South African tour and they will look to come up with better performances in the upcoming home series against West Indies.