Indian batsmen did a lot of drills in the practice session ahead of the first Test of the 3-match series in Eden Gardens, Kolkata but the stand out of them was facing short balls against the pacers and playing sweeps against spinners.

The support staff of Team India was seen giving throwdowns of short pitch deliveries as the likes of Ajinkya Rahane, Shikhar Dhawan, KL Rahul and captain Virat Kohli warmed up for their first training session.

Rahane took the throwdowns for around an hour and it was the longest one among the other batsmen. Earlier, he was seen tested by short-pitch deliveries, an indication of what Team India is preparing for when they tour South Africa for around 2 months for 3 Tests, 6 ODIs, and three T20Is.

The Mumbai lad was even seen playing some unorthodox shots against Ravichandran Ashwin and Kuldeep Yadav, hinting their planning to destroy Lankan spin-duo against Rangana Herath and Lakshan Sandakan.

Despite the fact that skipper Kohli was the last one to land in Kolkata, he was in full flow during the two-and-half-hour practice. He started off with a few drills like stretching, one-legged jump.

Kohli also took the throwdowns and faced some short-pitched deliveries before heading to the nets, where he too approached spinners with the reverse sweep shot.

The Saurashtra duo of Cheteshwar Pujara and Ravindra Jadeja, who recently played a Ranji Trophy match against Gujarat that ended on Sunday, opted to rest.

Later Rohit Sharma, who had scored his ODI world record 264 runs in Kolkata 3 years back, examined the pitch. Even Rahane and coach Ravi Shastri had a look at the strip individually.