When on Wednesday, Sachin Tendulkar scored his fifth Test century in 2010, India breathed easy. For the last two years, India has shared an unspoken secret about Sachin Tendulkar. Now it can be told.

From 2008, India has worried about where Tendulkar exactly was going to end up in the history books. Now we know Indians are somewhat obsessive about numbers but we also there are some never to be argued with. Like 99.94, for example.

Since Sachin couldn't get there, the concern was over the other number which could be calculated more easily than even a batting average. The triple-digit tally, the highest centuries in Tests. Merely getting a mountain of runs was not enough, it had to come accompanied by regular and frequent innings of heft and scale. Going into his 20th year in international cricket, it was in this one slot that Tendulkar had his closest match and it was why we wondered.

We still do a little of that. Every time we switch ‘windows' or ‘tabs'on our computer screens to check where he is. Or take a walk for some‘fresh air' to earn some proximity to a television screen. Or stop at a street stall to buy a ciggie or tie a shoe lace and catch a snatch of the score. It is just a swift check, a quick query - Is he further away? Is the gap larger? Is he putting even more distance from him?

The Him is Ricky Ponting, Australian therefore capable of mind-bending, heroic feats of century-scaling, with one eye, one leg and maybe even a broken wrist. To win a series with a Test-for-the-death kind of innings.

At the start of 2008, Ponting was just two Test 100s behind Tendulkar and his 37. All that the gap meant was a series versus Bangladesh, home or away. That year, both men peeled off four centuries, and the scores were still close, our fella at 41 and Australia's scamp-faced skip at 39.

It did not look good. In the year that followed, Tendulkar got to play only six Tests and managed two 100s. Ponting's single 100 in his 13 Tests may have worried his team, for India the distance was not quite enough. Three centuries meant, Bangladesh and what, a game or two against West Indies? New Zealand?

Ponting is just a year younger than Tendulkar but made his debut six years later and has played 21 fewer Tests. Batsmen of a particular dotage, particularly those whose joints have played six more years ofcricket, can start sliding at a rapid rate and India had anxieties. We had just survived a Tendulkar year in which the man averaged 24. Cricketing foundations shook on higher numbers even before the IPL Age.

After that blip, everywhere Tendulkar went, particularly overseas, he was given warm ovations as the crowd believed this could be his last innings in their home land. His home fans sweated under their sticky smiles of appreciation.

If he had to suddenly leave, we knew Ponting would pounce. The man was a born pouncer and even his fielding said so. Tendulkar's response in these times, was to merely shake his shoulders, adjust various pieces of protective equipment and take guard.

Not so soon, he seems to say.

When the R-word is brought up, he merely smiles and replies he will know when and let us know too. The Morse code of his batting though has churned out five Test 100s already this year, not to forget the first double century in ODIs last year. Not so soon.

No wonder India cannot wait for the short Test series whose sudden scheduling does not please Ponting at all. The two are now separated by nine Test 100s. Tendulkar may or may not be keeping tab (but let's not give the benefit of doubt to batsmen in cricketing mathematics) but playing Australia is a contest he has always liked getting stuck into.

Under that calm demeanour and those lovely manners is a fixated, ice-cold competitor who confesses that the only people he doesn't mind losing to are his children.

Australia is where he found his feet, made his mark and announced his arrival to the world as more than a teen prodigy. Tendulkar has played more Tests against the Aussies (29) than any other nation and in the course of those games, scored more runs (2748) and hundreds (10) too, coincidentally at the time the Aussies were growing stronger. Of all those numbers, again, Tendulkar's figures in Australia - Test, runs, centuries, average - are higher than those when playing the bold enemy at home.

There's a story that Ravi Shastri tells about his 196-run stand with Tendulkar in Sydney on an otherwise dismal 1991-92 tour. Shastri, on his way to a double century, was being worked over with the verbals by Merv Hughes and party.

Tendulkar, all of 18, was enraged at the exchange and at a mid-pitch meeting, told Shastri that he'd heard enough and was going leap into the stoush and help him out. Shastri's advice to Tendulkar was to keep out of the debating society and just play his game. When the Aussies come visiting again in two months, Tendulkar would most certainly love to have the last word.