Rest, relaxation and recovery. Three Rs which are not always immediately associated with tournament success, but listen to Bill Beswick, the sports psychologist who was so integral to Alex Ferguson at Manchester United, and you will hear it remains one of the most critically unappreciated areas of coaching.

Terry Venables understood that at Euro 96 and, at the team’s Burnham Beeches Hotel base, a piano bar, putting green, billiard room and jacuzzi were focal points for players looking to recharge.

Fast forward 25 years and the culture change across sport is somehow perfectly encapsulated by the sight of what look like small black pop-up tents dotted around the communal areas of England’s St George’s Park base.

The sign outside is certainly intriguing. “Hotpod,” it says and, once through the zipped entrance, the players find out exactly why.

At 37 degrees, the pods live up to their name and have the added benefit of helping to acclimatise the body to hot weather conditions.

There is a comfortable matted floor, relaxed mood music, dimmed LED lighting, lavender, orange and bergamot scents pumped out by an oil diffuser and the choice of a yoga teacher or a screen where you can simply plug in some headphones and follow a class.

This is Hotpod Yoga, an innovation already used widely across professional rugby and which, for the first time, has been part of the England football team’s preparations during a major tournament. It is also being used by the British women’s Olympic football team.

Video footage was released last week, and the sight of Mason Mount, Phil Foden, Kyle Walker, Tyrone Mings, John Stones and Harry Kane being taken through a class has already attracted more than one million YouTube views.

The co-founder of Hotpod Yoga is Max Henderson and, with more than 60 public sites around the country, the concept has been gathering traction both inside and outside elite sport.

The Harlequins rugby union team were the first professional club to regularly use the pods from 2013. Others followed suit and they were taken to Japan for the 2019 World Cup by the Rugby Football Union.

England rugby captain Owen Farrell is a convert and, as word has spread in the sports science community, they have been used by leading tennis players such as Andy Murray, as well as the England football team.

They are proving to be increasingly multi-purpose. With space for 20 people inside a larger pod, rugby and football teams often use them in a group setting on the day after a match for recovery. “One of the challenges is that the players are inevitably bruised, beaten and just very stiff,”

Henderson says. “The warm environment is immersive - it makes you more supple and is great for opening up the body. Teams use them for quite passive recovery classes to prepare the body for training again, and that is obviously vital during a tournament.”

Once recovered from a match, there is then the option of more intensive strength and conditioning yoga classes in sufficient heat to also provide a cardiovascular workout.

There is the team-building element, but some of the most positive feedback has related to mental health and the chance simply to zip up a smaller mini-pod and unwind in solitude without physios, phones, team-mates and coaches.

“The pods shut you off from the outside world - you have nothing to focus on but yoga and breathing,” says Henderson. “When we started with rugby, you were aware of this macho environment and it was very much about flexibility and stopping people getting injured. Players are more holistic now. The mental side has become almost more central to the value to sports teams.

“It can also work before a game. For some, it is part of the routine to get focused. Some feel energised and invigorated. Others are relaxed.

“It’s versatile and the feedback so far from the England team has been very positive.” (© Telegraph Media Group Limited 2021)

Telegraph Media Group Limited [2021]