Aakash Chopra has made a stunning admission and said that Gautam Gambhir was his competitor and not a friend. The former opening batsmen used to play for Delhi together. They also opened the innings for India but on different occasions. Aakash made his India debut in 2003. Gambhir played his first Test match in 2004.
Both served the Delhi cricket team for a long time. Speaking to Raj Shamani YouTube channel, Aakash opened up on his equation with Gambhir and made the stunning admission.
"We were competitors to begin with. He wasn't a friend, to be honest. (But he was a) very passionate guy, very hard-working, and very serious about his craft. And he scored a lot of runs. But he always wore his heart on the sleeve, was extremely passionate, and could short-fuse very quickly in terms of temperament," Aakash said.
"We are competitors because we were fighting for one place. Our team was very good. When we were playing, only one of Kohli and Dhawan got the chance to play. The team was like that. In fact, there was no place for Viru to open the batting. Viru batted four so that we can accommodate one of Shikhar and Virat at 3."
Aakash played 10 Test matches for India from 2003 to 2004. Gambhir replaced Aakash in the playing XI and he played his first Test match against Australia. Aakash continued to play domestic cricket and tried to make his India comeback.
Aakash had a legendary run in first-class cricket and he piled up 10839 runs in 162 matches. He left Delhi towards the end of his career and joined Rajasthan. He also represented Himachal Pradesh in domestic cricket.
Aakash retired from domestic cricket in 2015. He played his last first-class game in 2012. He took up commentary after his retirement and is now one of the top faces in the commentary box.