Yuvraj Singh and Zaheer Khan in intense training camp in France

Indian cricketers Yuvraj Singh (L) celebrates with team mate Zaheer Khan

Former India international’s Yuvraj Singh and Zaheer Khan have put themselves through an intense training camp in France in a bid to regain their places in the Indian team, and have set their sights on the World Cup of 2015.

The two stars have been training at Brive La Gaillarde, which is a town in southern France for the past six weeks. They were coached by Tim Exeter a well known high performance coach in Europe. Exeter generally works with footballers and rugby players, and this is his first experience with cricketers.

Being completely away from public contact, the cricketers have virtually led the lives of Shaolin monks for the past six weeks, a stint which they have successfully completed last Friday.

Exeter is a speed and movement specialist and believes that his present stint with the two cricketers has made them fitter, stronger and faster.

“You will be surprised when you will see them. Both Zak and Yuvi are in better shape to do the things they want to achieve,” Exeter told NDTV.

“I don’t know about the current players in Team India and I am not a cricket coach, but I can only say that age is just a number. Giggs still plays for United at 39 and both Yuvi and Zak are much younger. If they can maintain the follow-up programme, they will compete with anybody in Indian cricket and don’t forget that they have loads of talent and experience,” Exeter added.

Yuvraj has had a poor run of scores scoring only one fifty in his last ten ODI innings, which was followed by a poor showing in the IPL where he failed to make any score in excess of fifty. Zaheer Khan also had a poor showing in the Test series against England in November of 2012 and has not played Test cricket since.

For five hours every day over a period of two sessions the duo were put through their paces by Exeter. The focus was on making the cricketers not only fitter and quicker but also more resilient to injury.

Yuvraj believes that there was no magic wand to success, and is focussed to work hard. “2015 (World Cup) is very much a goal and I am really determined to make it happen,” said Yuvraj. “After recovering from cancer I started well. But then I had issues with my form and back during the IPL. I have seen many ups and downs to deal with this. Hopefully, the coming season will turn things around. I am giving my best. That is what I can do. Rest is destiny,” Yuvraj said.