In the wake of all the bad publicity the pitch at Lahore got, the Faisalabad strip will be under intense scrutiny. If stats are an indicator then Shoaib and Co might prove to be a handful. Since 1995, spin has yielded 86 wickets at 38.07 and a strike rate of 81.26 while the fast bowlers have done far better: 150 wickets at an average of 26.13 and strike rate of 51.33.The toss didn't matter at all at Lahore, but how important will it be at Faisalabad? On 18 out of 23 occassions, the captain winning the toss has elected to bat but only five times has the team gone on to win while 11 games have been drawn. But given that since 2000, the average partnership for each wicket in the fourth innings is just 27.6, compared to the 44.8 in the third innings and 30-plus averages in the first two, teams will want to avoid batting last.The four Pakistan v India encounters at Faisalabad have been high-scoring affairs, no surprise then that three have been drawn. On average 1218 runs have been scored per match, and the drawn matches have barely reached the fourth innings.