From a low of finishing last in the inaugural edition to the indescribable peak of winning the IPL last year, Gilchrist and his band of followers have seen it all, but missing out on the Champions League berth after imploding stunningly against the Royal Challengers Bangalore, the Deccan Chargers captain was forthright in his opinion.

As an international cricketer, Adam Gilchrist has seen more highs than lows. Having been part of the all-conquering Australian team for whom defeat was anathema, Gilchrist finds it hard to digest a loss. Then again, having played the game for so long and in such illustrious manner, the Australian is candid in his views.

Unlike other squads, the Chargers’ local quotient were an inexperienced lot, but having said that they did raise themselves when it mattered to pull off five wins on the trot, when no one gave them a chance, to qualify for the semis.

That in itself was a plus and Gilchrist is happy with the achievement. It goes without saying that going down in such poor fashion, 82 all out in 18.3 overs, doesn’t speak highly of the team, but it was a case of running out of steam in the play-offs. “We saved our worst for last, unfortunately, and I am not sure why. I wish I could say a magic answer to why. No one meant it, maybe we just ran out of steam. We let our owners down, we let our fans down, we let ourselves down more than most,” said Gilchrist after finishing fourth in the league.

Time and again, Gilchrist has talked about being able to retain a few players in the team to sustain the branding that has been developed over the last three years, and he reiterated his desire to play for the Chargers again. “Most definitely I would like to (carry on), obviously the franchise needs to work that out. We all need to find out from IPL what’s going to happen with players’ retention and auction. I suspect that’s the last thing on the administrator’s mind at the moment.”

At 38, Gilchrist is no longer getting younger and even the supremely fit Aussie realises the toll the game takes on his body. “I had some niggling, well, some injuries throughout this tournament that I have never had in my career. So I had to try and manage that, so that was new to me but I am fit, physically fit enough, agile enough and very keen too,” he said.