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To add gravity to their duel, neither Australia nor India can afford to lose. Both sides entered the Super Sixes without retaining a point from the first round and must win all their next three games to have a strong chance of reaching the semi-finals.

The two men go back a long way. When the young Warne made his Test debut in Sydney in 1992 he ran straight into Tendulkar’s bat. The Indian made a century, the Australian took one wicket for 150. One match later Warne was dropped.

He returned, however, to become one of the greatest bowlers of all time, with more than 300 Test wickets. His first Ashes delivery,spinning over a foot from outside leg to clip Mike Gatting’s off stump, is remembered as `The Ball of the Century.’

Tendulkar, however, will go into the encounter with a psychological advantage as awe-inspiring as a Bombay traffic jam. His last three one-day innings against Australia have all ended in big hundreds. Warne watched two of them from 22 yards away.

Tendulkar hit 143 and 134 last April as India won the Sharjah Cup. Warne, struggling at the time with a serious shoulder problem that later required surgery, had joked: “I can’t sleep at night. I have nightmares about the guy.”

Sharjah had come immediately after Australia’s tour of India, where Warne had also been mauled. The Indians had decided to target him from the first ball of the first match. Warne left the country with 10 wickets costing more than 50 runs apiece.

Warne and Tendulkar share an enormous mutual respect but could not be more different. It is hard to imagine Tendulkar with peroxide hair and an ear-ring. Warne, while popular,has a reputation for speaking before engaging his brain. Tendulkar’s words are as well-considered as his forward defensive. It will snow in high summer in New Delhi before he resorts to sledging.