Hayden serves a warning

India may have had the better of the exchanges in the first Test, but Matthew Hayden showed just what might be in store for the Indians in the remaining Tests. His 99 was remarkable for the utter disdain with which he treated even the good balls. Of the 98 balls he faced, 51 of them pitched on a good length, which were dispatched for 52 runs. When the Indians pitched slightly short, though, Hayden was far less destructive: 30 balls just short of a length fetched just 12 runs.

Ajit Agarkar was the only bowler who managed to curb the Hayden charge. As the table below shows, against the rest of the bowlers, Hayden scored at more than a run a ball.

Meanwhile, two wickets in the Indian second innings might have saved Nathan Bracken from being dropped for the second Test. One of those wickets was, inevitably, Virender Sehwag's, whom Bracken has now dismissed five times in the last five innings, stretching back to the first match of the TVS Cup tournament in India. Sehwag did manage 17 runs off Bracken in the first innings, but most of those were after he was dropped in the slips off Bracken early in the piece.