Australia captain Ponting celebrates his century against India

Australia captain Ricky Ponting made a spectacular return to form with 124 to lead Australia to an 18-run victory over India in Sydney.

The hosts gave India a daunting target of 318 to win, with Matthew Hayden and Andrew Symonds also smashing half-centuries.

Gautam Gambhir's 113 gave India hope and a spirited fightback from the lower order made for a tense finish.

But Brett Lee took five wickets for 58 to seal Australia's win.

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Australia held off a spirited fightback from India, who posted the highest score by a team batting second in the CB Series so far.

Harbhajan Singh and Robin Uthappa led the comeback, with the latter smashing 51 off 43 balls, but their hopes of an unlikely win were obliterated by Lee whose scalps included the prize wicket of Sachin Tendulkar for two.

Gambhir had earlier hit 113 off 119 balls to rescue the tourists' following the losses of Tendulkar and Virender Sehwag, who was caught behind off Stuart Clark for 17.

After winning the toss and deciding to bat, Australia overcame the early loss of Gilchrist to make a promising start.

Gilchrist went courtesy of a spectacular catch from wicket-keeper Mahendra Dhoni who shortly after was asked to change his gloves.

Dhoni's gloves were apparently in breach of the rules because they had extra webbing between the thumb and the forefinger.

Gilchrist's departure brought Ponting to the crease and he and Hayden brought up Australia's first 100 in 75 balls as Sreesanth and Ishant Sharma bore the brunt of the blitz.

Ponting made his 26th one-day international hundred of 111 balls with a scurried single before passing 11,000 runs in limited overs contests shortly afterwards.

Australia's skipper eventually departed when he holed out to Pathan on the boundary before James Hopes and Lee were run out in the final over.

• India captain Mahendra Dhoni:

"The start we got was quite disappointing, but I think there were quite a few positives from the game.

"He (Gautam) was very calm and cool and played the right shots.

"With one partnership at the top it would have been more close."

• Australia captain Ricky Ponting:

"It was another good win by us, although they got a few more runs than we would have liked towards the end.

"Our batting was excellent today and it's been coming for a while.