First Test, Hamilton (day three, close):
New Zealand 279 & 75-3 v India 520
Match scorecard

Tendulkar's 260-ball knock included 26 boundaries

Sachin Tendulkar completed his 42nd Test century as India turned the screw on New Zealand in the first Test.

Resuming on 70, the 35-year-old reached his century before lunch and eventually fell for 160 after edging a superb Iain O'Brien ball to Ross Taylor at slip.

Zaheer Khan's speedy 51 helped the tourists to 520 and a lead of 241.

New Zealand's second innings got off to a shaky start with Tim McIntosh caught by Tendulkar at slip for a third-ball duck and the home side limped to 75-3.

But the day belonged to Tendulkar. His 260-ball knock included 26 boundaries and was largely responsible for India posting such a substantial total.

But he felt it was not a fluent knock until the second new ball arrived.

"I started timing the ball much better and after that things were different," he said.

"I was prepared to wait for my chance to come and when I found the centre of the bat consistently I felt I was playing a different game."

He rarely looked in any trouble before O'Brien forced the mistake after lunch in a decent spell of bowling that had already seen him remove MS Dhoni for 47.

The India skipper edged O'Brien's first ball after the interval just short of Jesse Ryder in the slips before feathering another to Brendon McCullum behind the stumps two balls later.

Zaheer and Harbhajan Singh took the attack to the home bowlers and added a quick 20 before the latter handed Kyle Mills his first wicket of the match, slashing to Daniel Vettori at mid-off.

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Flynn dropped Zaheer on 34 and the Indian bowler took advantage, hitting eight boundaries, to bring up his third Test half century, but he ran out of partners as Vettori had Ishant Sharma and Munaf caught by McCullum and Chris Martin respectively.

New Zealand's hopes of building a solid foundation to their second innings were ended by the controversial dismissal of McIntosh.

Television replays suggested the ball he nicked off Zaheer may have bounced before it reached Tendulkar.

But the Indian batsman was confident the catch was legitimate, saying "otherwise I would not have appealed for it".

New Zealand coach Andy Moles called the dismissal "disappointing" but conceded his biggest concern is surviving two more days.

"For a start we've got to save the game," he said.

"We haven't bowled well enough for long enough periods, we haven't batted well enough in pairs for long enough and in the field we've been sloppy. So not a very good advert for the Test team."

Martin Guptill and Mills also fell before the close of play - the former falling just two runs short of scoring a maiden half century on his Test debut after scooping a Harbhajan delivery to Virender Sehwag.

Nightwatchman Mills fell to the final ball of the day, trapped leg before by Munaf Patel for two, to leave New Zealand 166 adrift and facing a heavy defeat.

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