TimesofIndia.com in Birmingham: The Indian cricket team left for Birmingham from Leeds in a bus on June 25. The entire squad and members of the support staff boarded the coach which was going to cover the around three-hour journey to India’s next destination in the Anderson-Tendulkar Trophy. Plenty of players travelled with their own pillows for the road trip. KL Rahul took this up a notch with a foldable mattress in the luggage compartment.Upon prodding, it became evident that the batter prefers to carry his own mattress for uniformity in sleep. Are there some health/fitness concerns? Not really. Most players in the squad don’t like the hotel beds and Rahul’s own arrangement means he doesn’t have to deal with the softer hotel beds.Go Beyond The Boundary with our YouTube channel. SUBSCRIBE NOW!The team reached bright and sunny Birmingham on Wednesday (June 25) afternoon. Jasprit Bumrah made a run to the grocery store nearest to the coach station for some essentials. For the rest, it was a day of settling in a luxury hotel.
Right from the Champions Trophy in Dubai, head coach Gautam Gambhir and batting coach Sitanshu Kotak have been spotted together during the evening hours. Wednesday was no exception as the duo were spotted strolling around a famous spot in the city.
Rest period continues and there are more player sightings in store as the second Test is still some time away.
Endless coffee runs
Coffee runs started in Leeds, will continue in Birmingham, move to London then to Manchester before the long summer culminates at The Oval. The players stepped out in groups for coffee in Leeds, meals and it was a regular feature before the series opener got underway at Headingley.
The senior players in the setup have been regularly spotted with the youngsters during the time the team is not training or busy with the game. Even before boarding the bus to Birmingham, the likes of Kuldeep Yadav, Karun Nair, Dhruv Jurel, Yashasvi Jaiswal and fielding coach T Dilip ensured to stock up on caffeine before Rishabh Pant and Arshdeep Singh could do their magic with the beats on the bluetooth speaker.India didn’t train on Wednesday, have an off day today but there is a possibility of cricketing activity resuming on Friday.
