The Harmanpreet-Muzumdar era off to a promising start

As Harmanpreet Kaur carried out the silverware to her team, huddled around the 'Winners' placard in front of the Australian dugout on Sunday, Alyssa Healy borrowed a camera to capture a few clicks. She was yet to change out of her whites, or even take off her wicketkeeping pads.

Just under 24 hours ago, the two captains stood on the opposite ends of the dusty 22-yard strip at the Wankhede, involved in an almost squabble with one suspecting obstruction of field and the other calling it self-defence. A ball later when Harmanpreet cleaned up Healy, she even gave her counterpart a death stare for a send-off.

Of the many absorbing moments from this one-off Test, that the hosts won by eight wickets, these two frames probably best epitomise the rivalry that is India v Australia.

The two teams have lately been at each other's throats a lot in white-ball cricket, ever since India established themselves as worthy challengers to Australia's all-conquering aura in 2017. But a red-ball game in the subcontinent was a relative blindspot for both teams alike. Their last Test meeting was in the final quarter of 2021 - a historic pink-ball fixture.

Much water had flown under the bridge since. Australia were transitioning under new leadership and India had a new brain-trust to become acquainted with. In many ways the two began the series with a clean slate.

Conventional wisdom and historic evidence suggested that despite scoring the biggest win in women's Test history just last week, the measure of India's success truly depended on how they came out of this Australian challenge. With flying colours and a famous maiden victory to boot, India can now write back.

At every riveting turn and amongst many Australian counterpunches, India had a different protagonist stepping up to turn the game in their favour. If Pooja Vastrakar's early strikes were negated with a Tahlia McGrath counterattack,