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Three years ago their bowlers were no match for Michael Clarke and Ricky Ponting, and standing in the way this time is Smith, whose bat must seem as wide as the Nullarbor to the visiting team.
Smith has fallen to a bowler only twice this series and on both occasions was well past 100. It seems India's best strategy this series is to go in with the fingers and toes crossed.
"When anybody is in such form, you hope you have a bit of luck and get them out early," said Ravi Ashwin. "He's been batting really well."
Smith's 567 runs this series have come at a scarcely believable 189. His 192 was his career-best score. His average is now above 50. In many ways this has been a career-changing series, and not just because he has become Australia's 45th Test captain.
"I feel pretty good at the crease. Everything's working for me, which is nice," Smith said.
It is still too early for Smith to rank his latest masterpiece though even if he rates it at the top of the pile it could well be superseded by what he does in Sydney.
An indication of how much the game changed during Smith's seven-hour stay could be seen by the contrasting manner in which his innings started to how it ended.
His first 31 balls yielded just two runs, his last 37 came off 26 balls. Even as India had nearly every man out patrolling the rope, he was able to pick the gaps for boundaries, and not always with conventional strokes.
He even had the audacity to charge down the pitch and hook a bouncer from Mohammed Shami.
"It was pretty fun to be honest, batting in general is always fun," Smith said. "It was nice to be able to play a few shots at the end to try and get the total up as high as we could."
Smith fell eight short of a maiden double-century but was far from disappointed.
"I was just trying to get as many runs as we could for the team at the end. I got out to a pretty silly shot They had very man on the fence, I was trying to find a boundary, It didn't work out but that's ok," Smith said.
