By Justin Langer Australian Test batsman

Nothing much has changed since the Australian cricket team was last in the bustling city of Bombay.

This series promises to be an absolute cracker - a world title fight

Some faces within our team are the same, arguably a little wiser and more at ease, while others are younger and fresher and visiting India for the first time with their eyes wide open like little kids seeing Father Christmas.

The heat is as stifling as ever and while the constant horn blowing remains the same, Mumbai doesn't seem as claustrophobically busy as I remember it, although that might just be my imagination.

There also seem to be fewer obvious signs of the poverty which haunted me when I was last here four years ago.

The question most commonly asked when the subject of playing cricket in India arises, is what is it about the conditions which have proved so damaging to Australian cricket teams in the past?

The most obvious difference to me are the dusty, turning pitches which so heavily favour spin bowlers.

Traditionally there are few wickets in Australia that are anything like these.

Adjusting to playing spinners for the greater part of every day can take a long time, but in this party, most of our batsmen have spent plenty of time over the last few years playing on the sub-continent.

The one-day players in particular have played many tournaments in India, Sri Lanka and Sharjah, giving them the advantage of experience and expertise against the spinners.

Shane Warne is likely to be a key figure in the series

The improvement in our ability to play spinners was evident when we defeated Sri Lanka
3-0 on their home turf two series ago.

Overall, it was our batsmen's ability to play Muttiah Muralitheran which acted as the catalyst for what was one of the great series results for any Australian team.

Enormous confidence was gained from that victory which put us a step closer to being able to beat India during this upcoming series.

The second considerable factor in Australia's lack of success in India is the debilitating heat and more significantly intense humidity.

During training over the last few days, we have quickly been reminded that playing cricket in the sub-continent is like playing cricket in a sauna.

For the majority of the time your clothes are simply soaking wet and there is the constant feeling of being uncomfortable and dehydrated.

The final factor is that India in India are very difficult to defeat because of the incredible depth of talent they have to draw from.

Like us, they have depth in every department of their game.

They have three or four great batsmen who are backed up by a number of outstanding young talents.

Harbhajan proved Australia's undoing in 2001

They have a world class leg-spinner in Anil Kumble who is backed up by off-spinning star Harbhajan Singh, and they boast an array of exciting fast bowlers.

India are also a confident team who know they are the only team to have truly challenged us over the last few years.

All in all both teams are very evenly matched and it will perhaps be the team who are most hungry to win that will.

We have arrived in India with a bigger than usual squad; an indication of how important this series is to Australian cricket.

This tour has been dubbed the 'final frontier' and in many respects it is just that.

We have a mix of young talent and seasoned professionals who are determined to work harder than ever to win.

With only a single warm-up match and a handful of practice days to prepare, the first Test in Bangalore is rapidly approaching.

This series promises to be an absolute cracker, a world title fight, and we are primed and ready to start strongly.