Chandigarh, Oct 8: India held their nerve in the nail-biting final moments to snatch a dramatic eight-run victory in the fourth cricket one-dayer against Australia and keep themselves afloat in the seven-match series here today. The Indian batting line-up came good as they rattled up 291 for four and then stopped the mighty Australians at 283 for seven to reduce the margin to 2-1 at the Sector 16 stadium. The Australians were cruising along comfortably at 268 for five till the 46th over before two wickets in the span of two balls completely changed the complexion of the game much to the delight of a vociferous home crowd. Batting first, India owed their total to some lusty hitting by Robin Uthappa (30 runs off 18 balls) and captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni who slammed 50 off just 35 balls. Sachin Tendulkar (79) and Sourav Ganguly (41) provided a solid start to the side.

M Dhoni Man of the Match

For the visitors, the in-form Matthew Hayden hit a 92-ball 92 and Andrew Symonds scored 75 but the late order batsmen succumbed to the pressure to give the home team a sensational victory, their first over the Australians since January 2004. The two team will now travel to Vadodara for the fifth game to be played on Thursday. Needing 22 runs from last two overs with three wickets in hand, Australia could just manage six run from RP Singh's over after comeback man Murali Kartik had compounded the problems for the visitors by giving away just two runs in the previous over. In the final over with Australians requiring 16 runs, Zaheer conceded a four in the first ball but managed to give just four more runs in the remaining five balls, sending capacity crowd into a frenzy at the Sector 16 stadium which was hosting an international match after a gap of 14 years.

Earlier, Australia got off to a rollicking start and looked in tremendous hurry as they raced to 37 in five overs. India did manage to silence Adam Gilchrist (18) early -- he holed out to Zaheer Khan off RP Singh -- but his exit had no slowing down effect on Hayden who treated Zaheer with contempt while his captain Ricky Ponting hit RP for three boundaries in the 10th over. With the scores of 34, 75 and 60, Hayden has been the thorn in flesh and he kept tormenting the hosts even after Ponting fell to Pathan, stumped by MS Dhoni in the 19th over. Ten runs later, Michael Clarke (6) gave a return catch to Harbhajan Singh.

Symonds and Hayden were content with the occasional boundaries and had added 58 runs when Hayden perished at mid-wicket off Murali Kartik, which injected some life in the match. After a lull, Harbhajan claimed his second victim in Brad Hodge (17), with Dhoni doing a brilliant job behind the stumps, in the 44th over. Australia could have been in further trouble had RP been able to hold on to James Hopes' drive. The left-arm seamer made amends in his next over. Symonds wanted to play a feisty cut but missed the line and had his stumps disturbed. In the next ball, the pacer again broke the stumps, this time, however, with a throw that returned Brad Hogg run out for a duck.

Having made mess of their chases in the series so far, Dhoni did not think twice before opting to bat first. And though the early morning dew lifted the spirit of the Australian pacers, India, to their credit, got off to a decent start as Ganguly hit the straps soon even though Tendulkar looked at sea, especially against Brett Lee. Tendulkar would no way rate this 79 off 119 balls among his best but to his credit, he hung around to feature in solid stands of 91 and 83 with Ganguly and Yuvraj respectively to give India a good start. Ganguly got off with a third ball glance off Lee that raced to the boundary and then creamed Nathan Bracken for two fours in the sixth over to show why he is considered such a good player on the off-side. He later stepped out to hit the pacer over mid-wicket for another boundary.

While Ganguly looked fluent, Tendulkar was fumbling. The right-hander in fact had a traumatic start to his knock and was clearly uncomfortable against Lee. Going by snickometer, the Mumbaikar was actually out caught behind for a duck off Lee. A survivor of two leg before appeals, Tendulkar twice changed his bat but nothing really worked. Lee almost caught him off his own bowling when Tendulkar's ugly fending looped up only to land, much to his relief, in the no-man's land. Brief scores: (Agencies)