Test cricket will "die" without regular meetings between Australia, India and England, former Aussie bowler Stuart Clark warned. (More Cricket News)
Australia face India in five Tests between 22 November and 7 January, with the first match set to begin in Perth later this week.
India will be looking to retain the Border-Gavaskar Trophy after triumphing 2-1 on home soil in the teams' last series in 2022-23.
But Clark, who represented Australia between 2006 and 2009, believes the upcoming series has even greater significance due to the growing popularity of short-form and franchise cricket.
Speaking exclusively to Stats Perform, the former bowler warned the traditional format needs competitive meetings between Australia, India and England to maintain fan interest.
"If you compare to what we've just seen with this one-day series, people are still pretty interested in Australia – or at least in England and India – about Test cricket," he said.
"But there's a bigger story around Test cricket in that the international summer is only important to those three countries, whereas a lot of these other countries around the world, they're actually funded by their T20 tournaments, that's where they make their money.
"Whereas Australia, England, India it's in reverse. I think for the the greater good of the game, Australia, India and England need to really try and promote Test cricket and that's the biggest story to all of this.
"You know the Ashes will always exist because there's such a big rivalry and they want to beat Australia.
"But the bigger problem is what happens if India or Australia become weak and don't want to play one another? Or England become weak and don't want to play India?"
With Australia set to host the next Ashes series in 2025-26, Clark is aware of the need for Pat Cummins' team to test themselves against top-calibre opposition.
"If Test cricket doesn't remain the priority for those countries, then test cricket really dies. That's what no one wants to see, and the players are pretty adamant about that as well," he continued.
"Look at South Africa, look at West Indies. This series out here against India is a really big series, as it should be.
"Hopefully it's competitive and hopefully Australia win, but what we want it to be is competitive to try and grow that game.
"It's such an important series. These next two summers really set the tone for the following two summers, which are usually pretty dour."
