Ponting's shot at redemption, and Hayden's rare feat

Few can argue with the kind of numbers that Ricky Ponting has posted over his 13-year Test career. Just six batsmen have scored more Test runs than him, and only Sachin Tendulkar has more hundreds than Ponting's 35. Both those records are likely to come Ponting's way over the next few years, but among all the glittering landmarks he has notched up, there's one major glitch that'll bother him - one that, over the next month-and-a-half, he'll get an opportunity to rectify.

In eight Tests in India, Ponting has managed a grand total of 172 runs, with a highest of 60 - his only half-century in 14 innings here - and an average of 12.28. It's a damning statistic, especially for a player of his quality. Compare that with his average of 79.35 against the Indians in 11 home Tests, and the contrast is even more stark. In fact, among countries in which he has played more than one Test, India remains the only one where Ponting hasn't yet reached a three-figure score.

Most of Ponting's travails in India have been caused by spin, and by one particular exponent of the art. Harbhajan Singh has dismissed him eight times - the only other bowler to have done so is England's Darren Gough - but even that wouldn't be so bad if Ponting had made substantial scores before falling to Harbhajan. In those eight innings Ponting averaged 9.50, and went into double figures only twice.

All these numbers have invariably raised questions about Ponting's ability to play quality spin bowling (Ian Chappell was the latest to find fault with Ponting's technique) but all those low scores and dismissals against Harbhajan in 2001 are now more than seven years ago, and plenty has changed since then. For a start, Ponting came into that 2001 series with a career average of 46.69, nearly 12 runs fewer than his current average. He only had seven Test centuries to his name, a number that has now swelled five times. And equally importantly, he has handled spinners in all countries more than competently in these last seven years. He failed in his only Test in India in 2004, but that was on a minefield in Mumbai, in which only one Australian batsman topped 50.

He has done well against spin at home, in the West Indies and in New Zealand, but the most stunning stat is his average against spin in Sri Lanka - 92.50. Against the best spinner in the world today, Muttiah Muralitharan, Ponting has scored 172 runs from 243 deliveries, and has been dismissed just twice. In Sri Lanka, Ponting clearly dominated Murali, scoring 70 from 93 deliveries on the tour in 2003-04 without being dismissed even once. Saqlain Mushtaq, another high-class offspinner, hasn't had much success against him either. Harbhajan will obviously still be brimming with confidence when he prepares to bowl his first ball to Ponting in the forthcoming series, but it might not quite be the one-way traffic it was in 2001.

Hayden's aversion to caught-behind dismissals
For a batsman whose first dismissal in his Test career was a nick to the wicketkeeper, Matthew Hayden has managed to avoid that mode of getting out remarkably well since. Out of the 154 times he has been out as an opener, only 20 times has it been the result of a catch by the wicketkeeper. The percentage of 12.98 is the second-lowest for all openers who have played at least 50 Test innings since 1990. The batsman who heads the list couldn't have a batting style more different from Hayden's - West Indies' Daren Ganga, who is all stodge and defence to Hayden's aggression, has a caught-behind dismissal percentage of 12.50.

At the other end of the spectrum is England's Alastair Cook, who has nicked behind a whopping 18 times out of his 49 dismissals as opener, a percentage of almost 37. Out of the eight openers with the highest caught-behind frequency, five are from England, probably because of the seam and swing movement, which is more prominent in England than in most other countries.