"Yo-yo tests conducted after selection because of IPL," says Saba Karim

The Board of Cricket Control in India's general manager Saba Karim has addressed queries surrounding the aftermath of the yo-yo tests and has assured on the board's behalf that the tests being conducted after selections was just a one-off owing to the IPL schedule.

“It’s always conducted before team selection. This time the change happened because of the IPL. We have to pick the teams early because of the logistical reasons, so we couldn’t drag out players during the IPL and made them go through fitness tests. That’s why we conducted it after the IPL was over. And all the players were given enough time to prepare for that,” Karim told The Indian Express.

“Earlier, if you see, in the case of Suresh Raina and Yuvraj Singh, the fitness tests were conducted before the team selection. It always happened like that in the past. This time, the moment the teams were announced, whether that was the India A side or Team India, the players knew that they had to undergo fitness tests. So they had enough time to prepare. That is why so many of them prepared well and got through,” Karim added.

The failure of three selected Indian cricketers to pass the yo-yo test and their subsequent exclusion from the sides after being named in the initial squad raised a lot of questions regarding the timing of the procedure and fans and administrators of state boards alike were left pondering on the legibility and flexibility of the conduction of the test for few select players.

For instance, Rohit Sharma, after a failed attempt to get the benchmark score, was given extra attempts, that too postponed to as long as just two weeks before the team was bound to play their first match against Ireland. Execution of selection policies in such a manner is surely bound to raise questions with the constant chopping and changing of squads tends to dilute the cohesion in a touring squad.

Hopefully, the BCCI stick to their label of this year's fitness tests gaffe as a "one-off" and takes better measures from now on to ensure that only the players meeting their fitness standards are picked in the first draft of the selected squads.