A week after the Lord’s Test, the BCCI, through a press release, shared three things about all-rounder Nitish Reddy – he had a left-knee injury, he was flying home and the team had wished him speedy recovery.
Few hours later, at the start of India’s first full outdoor training session at Manchester, pacer Akash Deep was giving a fitness test and was watched by an anxious bunch of coaches and national selection committee chairman Ajit Agarkar. Akash Deep didn’t bowl at the nets on Monday and is unlikely to play the crucial fourth Test of the India-England series that the home team leads 2-1.
Injuries to both Akash Deep and Reddy, after just two back-to-back Tests, haven’t gone down well with the team management. After the Lord’s Test, players had been asked to improve their fitness and wheels have already started moving to put in place a proper protocol for assessing the pre-tour fitness of players.
Going ahead, especially for a long tour, the information about niggles and injuries a player is carrying needs to be put on the table. The new leadership group is keen to have a transparent and robust fitness regime since these sudden and frequent breakdowns are impacting the team’s plans and potentially the final result of Tests and the series.
Former Team India trainer Ramji Srinivasan, who was the Head Strength and Conditioning Coach with the 2011 World Cup winning team, says there is scope of improving the system. “I would definitely say it is very unfortunate these things happened in the middle of the tour. I think better precautionary measures could have been taken by the support staff,” he says. “There needs to be predictability about non-match injuries. There should be protocols in place – testing and assessment prior to the tour.”
At present at the National Cricket Academy, the destination for all wounded cricketers, there are protocols in place but don’t seem to be working and that has put a spanner in the planning.
After Birmingham, where Akash Deep took 6 wickets, India seemed to have cracked their pace combination. But the optimism didn’t even last one full Test. In the middle of the Lord’s Test, Akash Deep would walk gingerly out of the field, holding his hip.
Story continues below this ad
Mohammed Siraj, at the press conference, did comment on his pace partner’s fitness. “Akash Deep’s groin has some issues, so he has to be with the physio. He bowled in the morning but I don’t have any feedback from the physio yet,” he said.
India captain Shubman Gill, center and teammates react, during a nets session at Edgbaston, in Birmingham, England, Monday June 30, 2025. (Jacob King/PAvia AP)
Akash Deep had a niggle at the start of the tour – coach Gautam Gambhir had said this at the press conference – and that was why Delhi pacer Harshit Rana was called as a back-up. The Bengal pacer sat out for the first Test and only after a scan was done, he was declared match-fit. Rana was sent home. Now, another pacer has been flown in. Today Haryana pacer Anshul Kamboj trained with the team.
At Manchester, with the pitch looking damp from a distance and a heavy cloud cover over-head, the conditions seem ideal to unleash the best of Indian pacers. But it could well be an untested and debutant making the cut. Kamboj can get into the team, in case the team management chose him over Prasidh Krishna, who hasn’t been able to control his length on this tour.
The Indian team also might have liked to have Nitish in the mix at Manchester. At Lord’s, the pace all-rounder got the important breakthrough, bowled 17 overs and also had a promising partnership with Ravindra Jadeja. For a management keen on a long batting line-up, Nitish was their ideal man.
Story continues below this ad
Nitish is an intriguing case. Was he Test-series ready when he landed in England? All through the IPL, the all-rounder bowled just 5 overs. Daniel Vettori, the coach at SRH where Nitish plays, during the IPL had explained how it was because of injuries he was being under-bowled. “He brought a side-strain into the tournament, which obviously he has had throughout. That is the reason he missed a lot of cricket prior to that and then it was just a slow, meticulous build-up,” Vettori said. Was it the load of 17 overs being too much on the body of a player with a history of injuries?
Expert trainers say that modern science can actually predict injuries but the assessment has to be scientific and the players also need to be honest about their first fitness.
“There are various reasons for a player’s breakdown. It could be the wrong movement pattern, muscle overload but take away suppleness, lack of athletic training, and workload management. It could also be the case of a player concealing fitness (concerns),” says an expert on condition of anonymity.
But despite these many reasons, the potential injuries to players can be predicted. “All joints, all muscles have to be tested for strength and power and other things. There is equipment available in the market to do the fitness testing. These are things that should be etched in stone and part of protocol before a series.”
Story continues below this ad
Along with the injuries that can be controlled are the ones that can’t be. India, as luck would have it, have players who got wounded on the field. Just when it seemed that left-arm pacer Arshdeep Singh would finally get a game, he got injured and got ruled out of the Test. This was confirmed by the BCCI in its press release. It was while stopping a ball in follow-through in the nets that resulted in him getting a cut and subsequently stitches. The pitch and conditions would have aided Arshdeep’s swing but for the fourth straight Test he will be on drinks duty.
Today at the nets, Rishabh Pant too seemed to have recovered from the hit he took on the index finger at Lord’s. He was the keeper when the slip-cordon was taking catches. Once in a while he would show pain when holding a sharp catch but would continue to train.
Meanwhile, in the spin-net was the perpetual picture of the tour – left-arm wrist spinner Kuldeep Yadav constantly testing batsmen. Will he finally get a Test? Him getting into the team for the Manchester Test would be an irony. This would be the case of “horses not for courses”. Kuldeep should have played at Lord’s but was sitting out. He should be sitting out in Manchester but because of injuries and multiple combination complications he might just play.
