The Board of Control for Cricket in India is set to introduce new fitness tests amid a clash with its own staff after the series against England. The Centre of Excellence in Bengaluru is working on standardizing the base fitness factors.

Indian team has been plagued by numerous injury woes in the recent past. Hardik Pandya and Nitish Kumar Reddy are currently recovering from a quadriceps injury. Furthermore, players like Varun Chakravarthy, Harshit Rana, Prince Yadav and Washington Sundar are dealing with respective injuries.

Moreover, ace pacer Jasprit Bumrah was ruled out of the upcoming two-match Test series against Sri Lanka due to a knee injury, which he suffered in the ODI series against England.

A BCCI source told TOI, “The Indian players are not used to the Bronco test. Over the last year, the CoE had set different base parameters for players. It has now emerged that certain senior players were given much more comfortable targets to meet to clear fitness tests. The CoE staff had also cleared players like Harshit Rana and Nitish Kumar Reddy to make sure it was delivering players according to team management’s needs.”

The BCCI source added that Harshit Rana was cleared for the UK tour after recovering from a knee injury despite being overweight.

“The Indian team management flagged that he was overweight by four kgs. The CoE should have been much more vigilant. He has now been told by CoE staff that his weight can’t exceed 96 kgs. He is now 94 kgs and is expected to be cleared next week. But he was 97 kgs when he was cleared to be picked for the Indian team for the UK tour.”

Rana missed the T20 World Cup and the IPL 2026 due to a knee injury but suffered a fresh injury on the UK tour.