Cricket Australia v India - Fourth TestThere had been almost three days of epic and perhaps epoch-making cricket, but those were just the events leading up to Waugh, and emphatically not what the crowd had come to see.
That moment arrived shortly after teatime yesterday. The great man emerged onto the field through a thicket of photographers to applause and cheers that bordered on the rapturous. There were only two possibilities in keeping with the theatrical nature of the occasion: either a duck, like Donald Bradman, or a century.
Instead, Steve Waugh batted for 90 minutes, edged a few early on, stroked a couple of lovely cover-drives and the cutest of square-cuts, then nudged an outswinger and was gone for 40. He walked back into the pavilion to applause that might have greeted a 400.
He did not, however, remove his helmet to acknowledge it. For this, Waugh suspected, was not his farewell innings. There is a great deal of unfinished business in the Sydney Test. Last night it looked as though that would involve Australia batting again to stave off defeat and probably following on. By the close of the third day Australia were 342 for six in reply to India's Himalayan total of 705 for seven. They needed another 164 to avoid the follow-on, with the tail already exposed.
In keeping with the normal custom of Waugh's team, their response to being hammered was to hammer back even harder. Openers Matthew Hayden and Justin Langer put on 147 and Langer scored a century of such impertinent confidence he reached three figures with a reverse sweep.
This was a vicious counter-offensive: every four from Hayden, a batsman of frightening power, sounded like a car backfiring; Langer played with the freedom that used to be characterised as Caribbean.
But India had a spin bowler, Anil Kumble, capable of maintaining a semblance of control even against mighty batsmen with conditions completely in their favour. Steadily, he worked his way through the top order, varying his pace and his deliveries while maintaining his line, which his Australian opposite number Stuart MacGill proved completely unable to do. And then stand-in fast bowler Irfan Pathan removed Waugh and produced, almost at the close of business, one heck of an inswinging yorker to dismiss Adam Gilchrist.
By then the 40,000 crowd had been reduced by about three-quarters. They began streaming out the moment Waugh disappeared into the dressing-room. They were witnesses to history, as they had intended. But the history now looked increasingly like including India's first series win in Australia.
There had been another bit of unlooked-for history before that: Sachin Tendulkar's highest first-class score. By the time India finally declared, 39 minutes into the third day, Tendulkar had reached an unbeaten 241. Of the 241 runs, 188 came on the leg-side, as did 28 of his 33 fours.
The man most often cited for years as the world's greatest batsman removed the game's greatest stroke - the cover-drive - from his repertoire because it had been causing him too much grief. The result was an innings of less than sublime beauty and quite awesome discipline and composure.
Australians had spent the previous evening waiting for India to declare and some were aggrieved by their refusal to do so. But the Indian captain, Sourav Ganguly, had enough savvy to realise that if you find yourself with your foot on the neck of the neighbourhood bully, you do not remove it a second too early.
By batting on, he made it seemingly impossible for Australia to seize control of this contest. International cricketers these days watch everyone else's games on TV, and the best ones learn from them. India have acquired some of Australia's hard-nosed ruthlessness. The young wicket-keeper, Parthiv Patel, was too ruthless for umpire Steve Bucknor's taste and he gave him an angry finger-wagging for over-intimidatory appealing.
Bucknor is not easily intimidated himself, but the Australians, having perhaps drunk too deeply this week from the well of sentiment, look vulnerable to anything.
India First innings
(overnight: 650-5)
A Chopra b Lee 45
V Sehwag c Gilchrist b Gillespie 72
R Dravid lbw b Gillespie 38
S Tendulkar not out 241
V V S Laxman b Gillespie 178
S Ganguly b Lee 16
P Patel c Gilchrist b Lee 62
A Agarkar b Lee 2 I
K Pathan not out 13
Extras (b4, lb5, w4, nb25) 38
Total (for 7dec, 187.3 overs) 705
Fall: 123, 128, 194, 547, 570, 671, 678.
Did not bat: A Kumble, M Kartik.
Bowling: Lee 39.3-5-201-4; Gillespie 45-11-135-3; Bracken 37-13-97-0; MacGill 38-5-146-0; Waugh 2-0-6-0; Katich 17-1-84-0; Martyn 9-1-27-0.
Australia First innings
J Langer c Patel b Kumble 117
M Hayden c Ganguly b Kumble 67
R Ponting lbw b Kumble 25
D Martyn c and b Kumble 7
S Waugh c Patel b Pathan 40
S Katich not out 51
A Gilchrist b Pathan 6
B Lee not out 0
Extras (b5, lb5, w3, nb16) 29
Total (for 6, 80 overs) 342
Fall: 147, 214, 229, 261, 311, 341.
To bat: J Gillespie, N Bracken, S MacGill.
Bowling: Agarkar 18-3-82-0; Pathan 15-3-46-2; Kumble 31-5-103-4; Kartik 16-1-101-0.
