The cricket skills camp for the Ireland-bound one-day team began at the Chinnaswamy stadium here on Wednesday afternoon, sans six players. Sourav Ganguly, Yuvraj Singh, Mahendra Singh Dhoni, Rudra Pratap Singh, Ramesh Powar and Piyush Chawla failed to turn up on the first day of the camp, and official sources attributed their absence to strike that has thrown Indian flights out of gear.
They were expected to join the rest of the squad by Wednesday night. It was also learnt that the manager of the team for the twin tours, Chandu Borde, will not be coming to the camp. “Borde will not be coming to the Bangalore camp. He will meet the players in Mumbai when they assemble there before their departure to Ireland on June 19,” Board of Control for Cricket in India chief administrative officer Prof Ratnakar Shetty said.

Four-day camp
The four-day camp here will be monitored by bowling coach Venkatesh Prasad and fielding coach Robin Singh, Shetty said. Physio John Gloster and trainer Greg King will assist them during the camp.
After nine days of fitness-specific drills, the players got a feel of ‘nets’ as they took turns to polish their batting and bowling skills.
The absence of RP Singh, Powar and Chawla forced the management to draft five Karnataka bowlers to assist in the nets. Pace bowlers Mahinandan, Akshay, S Dhananjaya and spinners Ryan Ninan and Udit Patel got a chance to bowl at some of the big names in Indian cricket, with Rohit Sharma and Sachin Tendulkar too chipping in.
However, Zaheer Khan concentrated more on fitness aspects.
The left-arm paceman, who had suffered a groin injury during the Afro-Asian Cup tie in Chennai, was declared fit two days back and the Mumbaikar engaged in fitness drills, with Gloster keeping a close watch on him.
The second day of the camp will be a full-day session, with proceedings to start as early as 9.30 am.