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Pakistan v India 2003-04 A one-sided contest April 17, 2004 It was billed as the contest between India's batsmen and Pakistan's pace attack. In the end, it turned out to be a fairly one-sided contest, as - save Umar Gul's magnificent display at Lahore - the Indian top and middle order had the answer to almost everything that Pakistan's fast bowlers threw at them. The spotlight has mostly been on Virender Sehwag, Rahul Dravid and co, but the surprise packets of the series were the raw and inexperienced Irfan Pathan and Lakshmipathy Balaji, who easily outshone their more famed counterparts from the Pakistan line-up. As the table below indicates, the Indian duo were runaway winners, taking ten more wickets at a considerably lower average and a far better strike rate.
Meanwhile, Anil Kumble took care of the spin department for India, but Danish Kaneria didn't do too badly either, with seven wickets in two Tests at a reasonable average.
The key to the Indian batting was their ability to string together huge partnerships once they got starts. They had 12 stands of over 50, and on seven of those occasions they went to on convert those into century partnerships. Pakistan couldn't even manage half that number. Interestingly, the third wicket stand was the most prolific for both teams, but there, as in partnerships for most other wickets, the Indians were a shade better.
One of the few contests where Pakistan did end up with the upper hand was the Shoaib v Tendulkar battle. Shoaib nailed his man twice in the one-dayers and once in the Test series, while Tendulkar only managed a total of 86 runs against him. That's a stat which should give Shoaib license to gloat for the next couple of years.
Click here for the Test averages of both teams. S Rajesh is assistant editor of Wisden Cricinfo. © Cricinfo
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