The visitors had been set 516 to win by Mahendra Singh Dhoni, a target that leans convincingly towards the impossible rather than the improbable. The first ball of the chase was a gentle away-swinger from Zaheer Khan to his series bunny Matthew Hayden. The burly, surly Australian, who had 13 from three outings on this trip, charged down the track and went hard at it. A leading edge cleared mid-off and fell safe, but early indications were that a mad session of play was coming up. It did.

The fury with which Hayden went after the bowling was laced with generous doses of desperation, and 24 balls and 29 runs later, he failed to connect with an ungainly swipe off Harbhajan Singh’s second delivery and was given out leg-before. Four balls after that, it was Simon Katich’s turn to go for an uncharacteristic slash. The ball skewed off the splice towards point, hung in the air for a while before it started dipping; Sachin Tendulkar, a little slow off the mark, made up for it with a fine lunge to grab it inches off the ground. For the second time in three days, he looked 16 again.

The tea break did nothing to ease the visitors’ nerves. Mike Hussey, by far the best Aussie batsman in this series, didn’t last long, caught so palpably in front going for a pull against Harbhajan that he might as well have walked.

The off-spinner, fired up, was on 299 wickets and started looking too hard for his 300th, but it was Ishant Sharma instead who charged into the party.

... contd.