[Ska'dForLife-WBA]

England completed their intra-squad warm-up today with a flag-waving Mark Wood singing Jerusalem from the stand as the teams took the field. Having been set 255 for victory by Team Buttler, Team Stokes batted out a draw, shaking hands at 157-4. Gloucestershire opener James Bracey top-scored with 85 on the first day, before being caught behind off Jamie Overton. There were also half-centuries for Dan Lawrence and Ollie Pope on a Southampton pitch that was slow from the outset, with many nicks not carrying to the keeper and several short deliveries sitting up nicely for the batsmen to attack. Despite significant turn in the final session, Ben Stokes was his carefree self, contributing an unbeaten 37 off 17 balls, including three towering sixes and a reverse-sweep for four in a single over off Matt Parkinson.

The West Indies added reserve Shannon Gabriel to their match squad on Thursday, while England will name their 22-man squad for the first Test on Saturday morning, with Sam Curran now available after testing negative for Covid-19 on Friday.