• Source:JND
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Asia Cup 2025: Ahead of the 2025 Asia Cup, Indian cricket legend Yuvraj Singh offered some unconventional advice to his proteges, Shubman Gill and Abhishek Sharma, suggesting they take up golf to enhance their cricket performance.

After hanging up their cricketing boots, Yuvraj, a hero of India's 2007 T20 World Cup and 2011 ODI World Cup victories, has joined a list that includes Sachin Tendulkar, MS Dhoni, and Brian Lara, who have also embraced the sport.

"I have told them to play golf and I encourage them to play. It's very hard to find time, but I think the IPL is a good time for them to actually find time and hit some balls," Yuvraj said at an event.

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"It's up to them. Now they are superstars of the game and they have to decide what's going to help them be better. If golf can be something, then they have to decide that. But I encourage all athletes to play golf. I think it's a great way to unwind and it's great for the mind," he added.

Yuvraj believes playing golf can significantly benefit cricketers.

"I feel that any sport that helps you relax is going to be less taxing on the body and more fruitful for the mind. If you see the culture of golf in Australia, South Africa, England—the majority of the best cricketers have played golf from a very young age," Yuvraj added.

 

"You see a lot of these guys actually play a lot of golf and do less cricket practice during tours. You can't change something in a game in three days. But how can you recover and be mentally fresh for a game? So I just feel it's not just cricket. For any sportsperson in the world, they should play golf because eventually it will bring out the best in them in their sport," said the former all-rounder.

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Gill and Abhishek are likely to open for India in the upcoming Asia Cup, starting from September 9, 2025. Yuvraj said that if he had taken up golf during his playing years, he would have scored at least 3,000 more international runs.

"I would have scored 3,000 more runs. I tell all the young cricketers to try and play golf, hit the ball, see how you feel. Because sometimes too much practice is also not good for you. Sometimes when you're not scoring runs, you want to practice more, and with golf as well, you want to hit more balls. But sometimes it's good to relax," said Yuvraj.