In what is the last leg of India's preparations for their five-Test series against England, beginning at Headingley on June 20, they go up against the touring India A side in a four-dayer in Beckenham.
The match - in some form - will be played from Friday to Monday, but it will be behind closed doors, so to say, in a throwback to the way the Indians trained at Perth's WACA ground ahead of the 2024-25 Test series. On that occasion, the "black veil of secrecy" covered the training nets at WACA, not unlike the way India trained on their previous visit to Perth during the 2022 T20 World Cup.
Talking about the training sessions so far, bowling coach Morne Morkel told bcci.tv, "Two days [of] practice so far, conditions suited the fast bowlers. Early on in the tour is very exciting, you know, it gets their [the players'] confidence going. It was testing for the batters, which also in a way helps them to prepare for what's to come.
"I don't think the wickets [are] going to be as spicy as the ones we experience here [in the Tests]. There's been a lot of good banter between bat and ball. But I think that's only because the wickets are a little bit spicy. As soon as the wickets go flat, the bowlers tend to back off. So I am going to tell them not to only talk when the wickets are nipping around, but when it's flat, that's when we are going to need the character."
As such, the senior India team hasn't played a warm-up tour game since landing in England, even though some of the players in the squad, like Yashasvi Jaiswal, Karun Nair, Abhimanyu Easwaran, KL Rahul, Dhruv Jurel, Nitish Kumar Reddy and Shardul Thakur, did turn out for India A in one or both of their four-day games against England Lions.
Of them, Nair (259 runs including an innings of 204), Jurel (227 runs including three half-centuries), Rahul (167 runs including a century and a half-century in his only appearance) and Abhimanyu (167 runs including two half-centuries) showed decent form with the bat, while Reddy and Jaiswal also had at least one good outing. Reddy and Thakur were the only bowlers who are also part of the senior squad in those games, but were largely unimpressive. Reddy picked up two wickets across 26.5 overs and Thakur two wickets across 43 overs in the two first-class games.
"Now it is slowly building towards that first Test match. For me, the main thing - I think it's crucial in England - is consistency. There is consistency when we practice. It's consistency off the field, you know, finding your process, what's going to work for you as an individual.
"We've got a great variety in our attack of guys with different skill sets. So, you know, can they do that and still execute the basics very well.
"All in all, very happy with the start so far. I was a little bit nervous in terms of the lack of red-ball [cricket] we've played, but seeing how the guys are moving around and training the last three days, it's a pleasing sight. There's some quality energy in this group and, you know, that's what you need. You need to go into a Test series confident, you need to have that team spirit in the group and I think so far they have done a great job."