England will have very little cricket or no cricket during their break between the second and third Test in Abu Dhabi, head coach Brendon McCullum has said. England failed to take a threatening 2-0 lead in the 5-match series as they lost the second Test by 106 runs in Visakhapatnam on Monday.

However, England will take heart from their performances in the first two Tests. The tourists battled against the odds to stun India in the first Test by 28 runs in Hyderabad before coming up with a valiant effort with the bat in their chase of 399 in the second Test. England posted 292 on the board in the fourth innings, the second-highest total by a visiting team in the final innings of a Test India.

England will now head to Abu Dhabi to spend the long break before the third Test in Rajkot. Head coach Brendon McCullum said he had a chat with his Indian counterpart Rahul Dravid before the final day’s play in Vizag to enquire about the Indian players’ plans for the long break and revealed that England will spend time with their families in the UAE.

Brendon McCullum stressed the intense nature of the first two matches of the series and said that England will try to refresh mentally and there will be no training during their stint in Abu Dhabi. Notably, the touring side, led by Ben Stokes, trained in Abu Dhabi for 11 days before arriving in India before the first Test.

“I was speaking to Rahul Dravid this morning. I sorted of asked him what they were going to do after this Test match. He said they were all going to head home and have a bit of a break. For us, home is a long way away. So we are going to head to Abu Dhabi. all the families coming there as well. It’s a lot easier and we look forward to spending some time with family,” Brendon McCullum told TalkSPORT on Tuesday.

“Let’s just say it’s about digesting about the last few weeks which has been quite intense and also quite consuming. It’s about taking stock of things, for us and India, and then coming back to Rajkot and putting the graft on.

“There won’t be a lot of cricket stuff, probably won’t be any cricket stuff in Abu Dhabi, just as there won’t be much for the Indian boys as well. We have trained a lot, spent a lot of time in Abu Dhabi before the series as well. Two intense Test matches, for us it’s about refreshing the mental side of things and making sure we come back and put our best foot forward in the next Test match,” McCullum added.

The two teams are set to assemble in Rajkot next week before the start of the second Test, starting February 15.

India are likely to announce their squads for the last three Tests in the next few days. All eyes will be on whether or not Virat Kohli returns from his personal break and the availability of KL Rahul and Ravindra Jadeja who were ruled out of the 2nd Test due to injury concerns.

Tune In