Gearing up for South Africa

My injury has healed, I'm feeling fine - Dravid

Cricinfo staff

March 6, 2008

	Rahul Dravid: On the recovery path © Getty Images

Anil Kumble, VVS Laxman, Wasim Jaffer and VRV Singh checked in at the National Cricket Academy for the fitness test ahead of the South Africa series, starting on March 26. Over the next few days, Sourav Ganguly, RP Singh and Pankaj Singh will also undergo routine tests.

Rahul Dravid, who has been recuperating from a finger injury that he picked up in the Adelaide Test against Australia, was also seen at both the morning and evening nets. "My finger injury has healed and I am feeling fine now," he said.

Dravid has not played any competitive cricket since the Australian tour - he didn't turn out for Karnataka in the recent Ranji one-dayers - but has had intensive practice with the bowling machine for the last few days.

The tests today - held under the supervision of Paul Chapman, the physical conditioning coach, and Paul Close, the physiotherapist - included skinfolds, bleep tests, repeat sprint and aerobic strength tests.

Pankaj was supposed to arrive today but it's learnt that his physio in the Rajasthan Cricket Association wrongly believed that he could issue a fitness certificate himself. Pankaj is carrying a slight niggle in the back and it will be interesting to see how he fares in his fitness test on Friday.

While the more well-known bleep test involves short sprints, the aerobic vertical jump test records the difference between the height reached at full stretch with feet on the ground and from a standing jump. The skinfolds test uses callipers to measure body fat.

While Laxman, Singh and Jaffer left for the airport to catch their respective flights, Kumble, the local boy, bowled for 30 minutes at the NCA ground. He started off with some spot bowling before using his full regular run-up. As he left the ground, Dravid came in for his evening nets session.

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