Australia captain Ricky Ponting admits seamer Ryan Harris remains in a race against time to make his Test match debut against NZ.

A side strain has left Harris a major doubt for the match after being called-up following a brilliant season in the shorter forms of the game.

Although Harris was training at nearly 100% just one day before the match, Ponting said the call will be made on Friday morning.

"Ryan will play if he gets through as well as we want him to today and we'll wait and see how he wakes up in the morning," said Ponting. "That's going to be the important thing."

Although Australia go into the game as hot favourites after Test series wins over the West Indies and Pakistan, Ponting still expects another tough battle following on from his side's 3-2 victory in the Chappell-Hadlee series.

"Both teams really like to play each other and I think that's been highlighted in our one day series and as long as I've been playing," he said.

"They've always been tight tussles and I'm sure it'll be the same over the next couple of weeks."

In contrast to the ODI series, the Basin Reserve pitch looks to be bouncy and will suit the Australian quick bowlers.

Although Ponting was yet to have a close inspection, he felt it would be similar to the bouncy practice-wickets that the team has been training on.

"I haven't had a huge look at it yet," he said. "We trained here on Tuesday but I don't like looking at it [the pitch] that far out.

"The training wicket out the back has really surprised me with how much bounce there is though.

"When we were training there the other day it was like we were batting at the WACA.

"So that's encouraging for our guys because I know all our guys didn't want to leave the nets out there because they were so happy bowling."