Bengaluru, Aug. 29: In the absence of the experienced but injured Zaheer Khan, there will be added pressure on India’s fastmen to provide the early breakthroughs. On the penultimate day of the camp, the focus, not surprisingly, shifted to the bowlers.

On a truncated day of practice, the players quickly moved to the nets after a brief fielding session, involving some high catch practice. With bowling coach Venkatesh Prasad donning the umpire’s cap, it was clear that the bowlers had their task cut out for the day.

Of the lot, Ashish Nehra looked sharp and had the batsmen hopping with pace and movement. He consistently got past the outside edge of Suresh Raina’s blade and the left-hander seems to have got himself into a tangle in a feverish bid to sort out the puzzle of short deliveries.

Nehra even beat little master Sachin Tendulkar on a couple of occasions and gave Yuvraj Singh the treatment with a vicious bouncer that crashed into his shoulder. The impact left Yuvraj with a bruise and the vice-captain was later seen nursing his shoulder gingerly, with an ice pack.

Coach Gary Kirsten then turned his attention to Yuvraj. The South African threw length balls to the south paw and asked him to focus on carpet drives. Kirsten, himself a left-handed bat, also passed on a few tips to Yuvraj.

Later Yuvraj faced the bowling machine and was keenly watched by the coach and Tendulkar. After Yuvraj had had a few hits, Tendulkar walked up to him and gave him a few suggestions.

On the other hand, Ishant was a bit slow to pick up the pace and Prasad went up to him a couple of times to have a chat.

Meanwhile, Tendulkar looked good against the pacers, but uncharacteristically struggled against the spinners. He was beaten a couple of times by leg-spinner Amit Mishra.

On the other hand, Rahul Dravid was in his usual self, middling the ball nicely. After fine-tuning his defence, he unleashed some aerial shots against the practice bowlers.

Among the second batch of the bowlers, Praveen Kumar was on target and troubled Dravid and skipper M.S. Dhoni to an extent. His sharp, inswinging deliveries caught Dravid and Dhoni in front.

Meanwhile, former India skipper Anil Kumble visited the Chinnaswamy Stadium. After winding up the practice session, the team had a meeting in the evening. Sunday will be the last day of the four-day camp and it is expected to be a short session.

Gambhir skips camp

With the absence of the cricketers from last year’s Padma Awards ceremony triggering off a huge controversy, opener Gautam Gambhir ensured that there would be no repeat act. The Delhi opener, who was awarded Arjuna Award this year, left Bengaluru on Friday, mid-way through the camp to attend the award ceremony in New Delhi on Saturday.

Gambhir’s presence this year ensured that the cricketers would fly under the sports ministry radar this time around.