Smooth Aussies gliding along in India

Timing is everything where cricket is concerned. So it's fair to say there's only one side hitting the ball off the middle of the bat at present. While India contorts itself with nefarious issues of TV rights and election intrigues, the Aussies have slipped into cruise control with hardly a clunk through the gears.

Glenn McGrath has got wickets, the opening pair have got runs, and even Ricky Ponting's anointed successor, Michael Clarke, has risen to the acclaim with a polished half-century. If this is the final frontier, then - for the moment at least - it seems someone has forgotten to put the sentries on the gate.

Australia's entry into India has been as smooth as a Mark Nicholas handover. From their opulent base at the world-famous Taj Hotel, a stone's throw from the bedlam, beggars and balloon salesman who throng around the Gateway of India, the entire squad has been on a charm offensive.

Adam Gilchrist set the tone with an light-hearted press conference on the first day; McGrath followed suit by shelving his verbal bouncers, and even Brett Lee has got in on the act, impressing the locals with his grasp of Hindi (although not, it seems, the rowdy enclave at fine leg, who spent this morning informing Lee that he sucked - or some word of that ilk at any rate).

And then there's Shane Warne. He's been kept under wraps by the management for this warm-up game, although that hasn't exactly cramped his style. After all, winning the hearts and minds is a 24-hour job in this day and age, so Warne's (officially-sanctioned) nocturnal habits have been helping the cause no end.

On the eve of the match, for instance, he was to be found in the corner of an exclusive restaurant near the team hotel, buttering up a selection of Mumbai's elite, plus a certain high-profile Indian middle-order batsman. The name of the player (and, incidentally, the name of the bar as well)? Tendulkar. It was just the first of several encounters over the coming weeks, we hope.

And two days earlier, Warne's penchant for propping up bars had been utilised to the max by a certain globally renowned Australian beer giant. After an energetic net session at the Brabourne Stadium, Warne and his entourage retired to the Hotel Intercontinental on the seafront for a "beer and bites" afternoon.

With a beer in hand, a local DJ on one side and a "TV stunnah" on the other, Warne was asked a series of questions that ranged from the banal to the fatuous. ("Shane, are Indian women flirtatious?" "Yes"; "Shane, have you any got any Bollywood ambitions?" "Not yet ...") Okay, so the team has been asked to limit its commercial exploits, but keeping Warne out of the pub was always going to be a non-starter.

But anyway, let's get back to the cricket. The game was long dead by the time the third day began, but it was still a pleasure (and a rare one at that) to watch a match at the Brabourne Stadium. One local journalist, who as a boy witnessed Fred Trueman demolish the Indians in 1952, could still recall the days when the ground stood proud and alone on this plot of land, an area that had been reclaimed from the sea and donated to the Cricket Club of India in 1937 by the then-Governor of Bombay, Lord Brabourne.

It has since been subsumed by circumstance. The old recreation ground that backed onto it has long gone, to be replaced by a clutter of new (now rather old) buildings. And in 1974-75 it had its Test status abruptly whipped away, when the Bombay Cricket Association erected the functional and not-entirely-graceful Wankhede Stadium, not more than a couple of blocks down the road.

It is a great shame, because the Brabourne is a venue steeped in the game's history, as a tour of the magnificent pavilion will amply testify. Four floors and open-fronted, it is a hive of bars, restaurants and even bedrooms, the walls of which are bedecked with photographs from all eras. There are fading group shots of the various squads to have toured England; a series of stills showing Anil Kumble's ten-wickets-in-the-innings against Pakistan, and rather randomly, a framed scorecard from a "Grand Cricket Match" of 1893, between the Australians (843 all out), and Oxford & Cambridge (191 and 82 for 1).

All this history. But, it's fair to say, there's only going to be one timespan on any of the players' minds this month. Thirty-five years. Australia have made a near-perfect start to their quest, but as they set off for Bangalore tomorrow, they'll know it's time for the charm to give way to the offensive.