The Indian team bound for Asia Cup 2023 has been in Bengaluru for a fitness and conditioning camp ahead of the continental tournament which begins on August 30. India will play Pakistan on September 2nd in Sri Lanka in their tournament opener.
The various fitness and medical tests are being conducted along with the mandatory Yo-Yo test, of which recently Virat Kohli shared his score of 17.2 on social media and drew the ire of the BCCI, who have reportedly told the players to not share such confidential information like this.
Meanwhile, many thought Virat Kohli’s score would be hard to beat given his physical conditioning, but some reports have stated that young opener Shubman Gill has demolished the veteran cricketer’s score by posting 18.7 himself.
All the cricketers who have so far appeared for the Yo-Yo test have passed the cut-off level of 16.5 and almost everyone has undergone this test barring the five players- Jasprit Bumrah, Prasidh Krishna, Tilak Varma, Sanju Samson- who all came back from Ireland and joined the camp on Friday.
"The Yo-Yo test being an aerobic endurance fitness test, the results could vary from when you last played and how much of workload you have gone through in the past week. Gill as of now has the highest score of 18.7. Most of the players have scored between 16.5 and 18," a BCCI source told PTI.
The fitness cum conditioning camp has been organized by the BCCI as this was the only window before the World Cup at home in October.
"If the players have a gap between two tournaments, the National Cricket Academy's sports science team along with sports staff of India team does conduct all the mandatory tests," the source said.
Yo-Yo tests were introduced six years back during the time of erstwhile Strength and conditioning coach Shankar Basu and then the cut-off was 16.1 but since then the marker has been upgraded and it is 16.5 now.
Gill's score of 18.7 is a testament to that considering that he has played non-stop cricket since the start of IPL. The first big break he got since March was three weeks after the completion of the 50-over series in the West Indies.
(PTI inputs)
