HPCA stadium in Dharamsala

HPCA stadium in Dharamsala

TimesofIndia.com in Dharamsala: On a pleasant Sunday evening in Dharamshala, Jos Buttler was the first Gujarat Titans player to walk onto the ground. He paused for a moment, looked around at the majestic Dhauladhar range in the backdrop, and slowly took out his phone to capture the picturesque venue. Buttler was not the only one soaking in the scenery. The Indian players, led by the duo who recently earned their maiden Test call-ups, Gurnoor Brar and Manav Suthar, also stepped out with their phones in hand. IPL 2026 Orange Cap holder Sai Sudharsan took it a step further, sipping a cup of coffee while asking left-arm pacer Kulwant Khejroliya to record a video of him standing against the breathtaking Himalayan backdrop. Titans strength and conditioning coach Darren Veness appeared the most starstruck of them all. Like a kid in a candy shop, the Englishman wandered around the ground with his phone in hand before rounding off the evening with a selfie alongside his fellow countryman, Buttler. It almost felt like a ritual. Players walked onto the field carrying their mobile phones instead of their kits, and who could blame them? It is not every day that you train under the watchful gaze of the snow-capped Himalayas and for most GT players, this was their first date with beauty. Buttler's unique range-hitting Jos Buttler was the first to pad up and enter the nets. Interestingly, in IPL nets, you rarely see batters working on their technique. It is mostly slam-bang cricket, with players generally focusing on their range-hitting. The 35-year-old Buttler, who seems to have rediscovered his rhythm with back-to-back half-centuries in the last couple of matches, had a special request for the side-arm throwers and the spinners. During the 35 minutes he spent at the nets, the Titans No. 3 faced only low full tosses. Initially, he struggled to generate power against the dipping deliveries, but as the session progressed, he began tonking them into the stands. It was a very interesting training session from Buttler, with coach Ashish Nehra watching the action from behind the nets and applauding every clean strike.Watch out for this Titan Connor Esterhuizen, who joined the Titans as an injury replacement for Tom Banton, looked at his pristine best. Sandeep Raju, the Titans' performance analyst, called upon pacers Prasidh Krishna, Gurnoor Brar, Arshad Khan and Kulwant Khejroliya for an extended spell against Esterhuizen. Right-arm seamers Prasidh and Brar tested him with short-pitched deliveries, while left-arm quicks Arshad and Khejroliya targeted the pads and outside off stump respectively. No one was spared. The 24-year-old pulled, hooked and even played ramp shots against the pace of Prasidh and Brar. The shorter they bowled, the quicker the ball flew into the stands. Arshad and Khejroliya were also treated with disdain. Whenever Esterhuizen was batting, nobody around the nets felt safe. The cries of "watch out" only grew louder with every ball he faced. It is highly unlikely that Esterhuizen, who made his T20I debut earlier this year during South Africa's tour of New Zealand, will get a game for the Titans, with their four overseas slots seemingly locked in by Jos Buttler, Jason Holder, Rashid Khan and Kagiso Rabada. But the swashbuckling Proteas batter certainly looks like an extraordinary weapon in the Titans' armour.