Cricinfo - Blogs - Different Strokes - Over-rating Ponting to death

Batting, not bowling, lost this Test. If we cast our minds back to day 3, Australia scored a meagre 161/8 from 85.4 overs, an indication that their batting lacked intent. Getting run out stupidly for eight in the second innings was probably the most egregious error Ponting made in the match. His side's total of 209 was poor, but nothing to do with counteracting over rates. The Australian side of yesteryear might have got these runs, but batsmen in positions 2-7 failed in the second dig and that is why they lost the Test. Even if Watson and Lee had ripped through India, a total of 300 looked like it was beyond Australia on the fifth day.

Several onlookers were extremely vociferous in their criticisms. Jeff Thomson was easily the most memorable: "Ponting should have just gone for the throat and worried about the consequences later. Surely team management must have had a say in this as well. What a stupid decision it was. On the over-rate, I'd prefer to watch 60 overs of quality rather than 90 overs of crap."

If I was Ponting I would be hacked off if the cuffs to the back of my head were coming from the bloke whose name is on the trophy you're slogging your guts out to win, the bloke who your country's most coveted player award is named after, the bloke who is a highly respected former captain best-placed to empathise with your position, and the bloke who is a director on the board of Cricket Australia. Allan Border is all of these and as such, he should let commentary opportunities involving Australia go by the wayside.

What I am most gobsmacked about is that the omniscient rent-a-quote of Ponting bashing (and post 1960s cricket in general) has yet to vent his spleen. Surely it is time to poke Neil Harvey with a stick and get him to say something outrageous, like he has done so many times before? Something along these lines would be good: “Back when I was playing and Australia was actually quite good at Test cricket we'd have bowled 270 overs on the first day so that we'd never get ourselves into this sort of trouble, especially against a useless team like India. And anyway, it was a hell of a lot hotter over there in my day. Have I told you how good we used to be?”

As a Kiwi, I love it of course: Australians going feral on each other is what we watch for fun on TV here all year in the form of NRL (rugby league), AFL (Aussie Rules) and the A-League (football) so this fits nicely into that genre.

Ponting must be doing something right. His record reads: 48 played, 33 wins, 6 losses, 9 draws. And if Australians are going to start pointing the finger of selfishness, let's just take a moment to remember which ex-captain stood down from his national selection panel role in 2006 just four months after being reappointed because he was too busy, coinciding conveniently with his personal beer sponsor's launch of a beach cricket circuit in a so-called "ambush" of CA's official beer sponsor. Hint: It wasn't Ricky Ponting.

australia have won a test series in india five times whereas india have never won a test series in australia, australia lead india in all-time head to head in odis in all conditions and all countries, they lead india in head to head in all forms of the game in history, india have won only 4 tests in australia to 24 losses, india have historically lost twice the no of matches than they have won in cricket history, u know, india can never be at the top or anywhere close like it has always been.they will remain down the pack as always.
i am not coming back ever to read anything on this discussion.i have not read any posts.

"spirit of the game" --- such a convenient ruse !!
y only after tea time on that day??
so the rest of the day or days ..or series he did not care about the spirit of the game??
i dont remember seeing this excuse before the final day till allan border lambasted him.
till then the only ((even n the 2nd 'n 3rd tests)) he was talkin bout the captain's suspension.
remember when everyone was commenting bout the spat between Lee 'n ponting , there was never a mention of "spirit of the game".
ok i agree everyone's plans dont work out, especially all the time.
somtimes we all made bad decisions.
but atleast be a man.just standby ur decisions.
then u'll 've respect that legends command 'n perhaps 've other ppl vouching for u, rather than squealing bout "integrity" in the post match conferences like ponting always does.

What would have Ponting done if he had McGrath and Warne in that situation? Would he use Part-timers or the stock bowlers?

The Part-time bowling operation has been happening for some time. The captain should have known about this. This match was lost from a winning position!

On the captaincy I would rate Border as the best. He had a very inexperienced team to start with. He could bowl, bat, set very good fields, catch well and keep wickets. Captains need to be creative and tactical.

Like Dhoni said, India were happy to score runs when the part time bowlers bowled. I, being an Indian fan, am very happy as well that the pressure on India was let off at that crucial juncture. Irrespective of whether Ponting did it for "Spirit of Cricket" or to save his own ban, it helped India win the test. Ponting was in a similar situation even in Perth as well, where he let India off the hook for a very similar position, and India went on set a fourth innings target of 408. Ponting is a serial offender in this regard, but at this time the series was at stake and his inability to control the over-rate came back to bite him - again.

"Ponting must be doing something right. His record reads: 48 played, 33 won, 9 losses and 6 wins."

Of course he did something right. He was born an Australian! Anyone can rack up that kind of a record with the Australian cricket team at his disposal, but as soon as Australia are seriosuly challenged (by India, or by England at times) it's obvious that Ponting doesn't really know how to handle it and goes defensive, such as feeding singles to in-form batsmen and trying to take wickets at the other end.

As far as the over-rates go, maybe they wouldn't be such a problem if Ponting wasn't constantly "conferencing" mid-over and arguing with the umpires whenever a decision goes the other way. He's had a cushy job for a number of years, and now that the team as a whole has come down a bit, he just doesn't seem to really know how to handle the pressure.

Ponting allowed his team to fall behind on the over rate. This is all that happened. What the hell is all the uproar about??? I can't believe this!! People calling for his head. Just step back for a minute and stop reading below par journalists inflamatory crap and think about it. What the hell is the problem?? His crime was to fall behind. Something Dhoni himself did to an even greater extent but he got out of jail because Australia didn't bat the day out. Ponting was then in a no win situation. He tried to make the overs up - sack him. He brings back the quicks (who had been totally ineffective) and falls further behind - sack him. I can't understand the hoo haa. We lost a series in India. Heck, we've only won one in the last forty years!!! We lose over there regularly. Best point is, that India have never won in Australia. So before you Indians start carrying on, beat Australia in Australia. Then come and talk to me. Poms beat us too. Look what happened next time we played them.

I think this episode is clearly part of the 'bash Ponting at any cost' attitude prevalent in many people's minds (Indian, Australian or other).

Fine, have your opinion. Mine is that the crime was not what he did after falling behind but falling behind in itself.

I get the feeling that behind closed doors Ponting is thinking he's damned either way. (If his team were to bowl 70 overs in a day then he would be accused murdering Test cricket or he tries to fix the over rates and is called selfish).
Few would argue he is an innocent party now or in the past but the gleeful abuse only brings down those dishing it out.

Ponting is dealing with a unique situation in Australian cricket in the last 20 years - a team on the decline rather than the up. Whoever the captain, he is sure to have some hiccups dealing with that.

On with the cricket I say!

Ponting's win loss record as captain against India reads Played 9 matches (as captain against India), won 2 lost 4 drew 3. I do agree that despite this defeat, Australia is a better team than India. But what augurs well for Indian cricket is the fact that they have been the team that has challenged Australia the most in the past decade. It will take a long time for Australia to get dethroned from the numero uno position, but this defeat must leave other top teams like South Africa and England fancy their chances against Oz the next time they play them. However, as we have so often seen in the past, Aussies silence their critics in the best possible way (Remember the world cup win after the 2-0 defeat against England in the CB series and 3-0 drubbing against NZ?) No matter what, Aussies will find a way of comping out on top. But fact remains that the Border Gavaskar trophy belongs to India for the next 3 years before they meet Australia in a test series again.

Maybe Ponting made a mistake, but noone can say things would have turned out any better if he did things differently. India were always going to lead by 300+ and so were probably, by tea on day 4, going to win whatever Aus did from there. Seems to me India won the series by winning 3 tosses and then batting better than the Aussies did, especially Gambhir and Tendulkar. And the Indian bowlers were better than the Aussies. But get off Ponting's back! India are still not, overall, a better side than the Aussies. India just got smashed by Sri Lanka remember, and the Aussie win/loss ratio is far better, and India beat Aus at home on tracks that neutralised the Aus bowling strength and emphasised their spin frailties... Different captaincy was very unlikely to change the outcome given those factors (but 150 extra runs from Ponting in the 4th innings might have). PS how India, given they haven't won a test series in NZ for over 30 years, can have any pretensions to greatness, I don't know

How silly. Ponting was damned if he did and damned if he didn't.

The Ponting critics, particularly those from India, would have been the first on the bandwagon of Ponting "not playing in the spirit of the game" if he had allowed to over-rate to slip. Now that he actually did what the rules and spirit of the game require of him, he is berated for poor captaincy.

Honestly, I suspect if Ricky Ponting cured cancer, eliminated world poverty and then ascended into the sky, his critics would be lining up to accuse him of showboating.

"This spirit of cricket" excuse is a little bit difficult to accept. Australia were 9 overs behind at tea so they needed to bowl 39 overs in 2.5 hours (taking into account the additional 30 mins available). Even at the standard over-rate of 15 an hour they would have bowled 37 overs finishing just 2 short. That had been the case on virtually every day of the series. Both teams ended up 1 or 2 overs short even after using up the additional 30 mins and frankly doesn't make a hell of a lot of difference to the end result especially when the opposition was looking for a draw from day 1. So I don't know who Ricky is trying to fool when he says that he was obligated to bowl part-timers to keep up the spirit of cricket.

What's surprising to me is why both teams, throughout the series, couldn't bowl 90 overs in a day at any stage. It came back to bite Ponting in the last Test but it was obviously a problem throughout the series. Esp with a high proportion of overs bowled by spinners. It's not like we had any real scorching 40 degree days either. These guys are really fit athletes so fatigue shouldn't be a factor. They've got an army of support staff and boffins who have detailed team plans for every batsman so why does setting a field take so long? Is the ICC being unrealistic in expecting 90 overs a day? Surely not. Radical (unrealistic) theory but what about playing one player short per over that you fall behind each session? 3 overs down, 3 fielders down. I reckon they will miraculously stay abreast of over rate all day! It can be done.
Or both teams penalised equally so that they all have a vested interest in keeping the game moving. The batsmen also wasted a lot of time in this series

I agree Ponting has done the things in spirit of game. But his own history suggests he is not much cared about spirit of game n all. Ruthless is not being careless. He actually had the cushion of Warne where he can easily bowl either Lehmann or Symonds around him to quick the thing up. But now he had Krejza who is good enough to take wkts only at Econ. rate of 5 an over!!! What he should have done is to use part timers in middles so that he lags by 4-5 overs only. All he did is to move things out of control and then left with no other options later. Thing is, he suffered a lot in the India's Down under tour too. Obviously not learning from experience. Poor batting ahs cost him even more. Punter need to learn in a hard way... Best of luck dude.. Search for a quality spinner, to take wkt at reasonable rate...

waterbuffalo: Oh OK so every time Border, I Chappell, Taylor and S Waugh speak we all kowtow and are deemed to be wrong if we disagree to them - well, bollocks to that. Wasn't it Ian Chappell that said he rated Ponting a better captain than Waugh?

mahim gupta: I never picked you as a rabid Australian fan, but there you go.

flyslip: I have nowhere near an ounce either - merely a micron. It was not a fait accompli - the Australian batting on the day wasn't good enough to get 250, let alone 300.

Murali: There were faults on more than one side that day at Sydney mate.

Ishan: Underestimate the mgnificence of Iain O'Brien and Aaron Redmond at your peril.

I don't agree with Yerhornsen saying Indian conditions neutralised Oz bowling strength. But Indian bowlers bowled better than Oz bowlers in the same conditions. Have you forgotten what happened in Perth, which was condusive to Oz strength, i.e., fast bowling, when India's last tour to Oz. Aussie press wrote Shaun Tait will blast Indian batsmen's heads at Perth, but India proved everyone wrong by blasting Oz out of shape at their own backyard and Shaun Tait went wicketless in the match. Hi, Yugal, do remember that India should have won that series, but for the illegitimate win by Oz at Sydney. I accept still Oz is no. 1 team, but the gap is getting narrower and India is the only team which threatens Oz supremacy in the last 5 or 6 years.

Wow, I love this defence you guys are putting up for him... "Well he was damned either way, LEAVE HIM ALONE" and how you guys use this to pick on his critics, particularly those from India. If Ponting is more worried about how people will perceive the way he /suddenly/ feels about the "Spirit of Cricket" than winning matches, then you have a more serious problem than his inability to maintain a healthy over rate, he might not be Australian! Here's a guy who flings his bat because an English sub runs him out, but then promotes a "generally unwell" Michael Clarke up the batting order with a runner! Thats a brilliant idea eh, send your injured men in first, maybe you guys could exalt him for giving Clarke a quick end to his torment? Outside a few one-eyed fans, I don't think anyone buys Ponting's "Spirit of Cricket" excuse, and once you don't buy that there really aren't too many logical reasons for his taking that course of action.

"David Barry: He brought the part-timers on as a response to the warning about the over rates"

How about telling us something we didn't know, like WHY he did this?

" - my point is not that he made a great tactical decision in doing so,"

I don't think anyone said that was your point, why bring this up?

"but that it wasn't motivated by selfishness"

wouldn't it be selfish to throw away your team's chances of winning a match and leveling a series because you want "to be seen" as the man who upheld the spirit of cricket at the cost of a team win?

"and it cannot be pointed to as the singular reason for the defeat."

Of course not, you have to consider the effect of the moon's gravity and global warming, critical elements for every game of cricket. I mean, nobody has ever won a match by giving themselves the best chance, have they?

Lets try again Captain Obvious, a simple "yes" or "no" will suffice, would the part-timers have bowled if there was no threat of suspension for the skipper?

BBHQ

Of course any captain who loses Warne, Gilchrist and McGrath- as well as Langer and Martyn- is going to be set for a rebuilding phase, and of course those retirements aren't Ponting's fault. All I'm saying is that in my opinion his tremendous success as captain was due mainly to having players of that calibre in his team in the first place, rather than any tactical brilliance on his part, and now that the Australian side is in a rebuilding phase, I think he's going to be a little more exposed as an average captain. Mind you, I don't think he's a terrible captain, and I do think he's improved a little since he first took the jon, but I also think he's too defensive whenever he has a real fight on his hands.

And I wasn't aware that Ian Chappell said that Ponting was better than Waugh, but if he did then it probably had more to do with the fact that Chappelli didn't really like Steve Waugh very much- I definitely recall them having words in the media on more than one occasion.

Ponting might have thought about his suspnesion and turned to part timers, but what was the guarentee that strike bowlers would have removed Dhoni and tail immediately while they could not get Zaheer and Bhajji out in Bangalore.

Forget about Ian Chappel's comments. He was criticizing Ponting for including Krejza in the last game before the start of the game citing various reasons like nerves. Once Krejza got wicket, post lunch he asks why Krejza was not included in earlier games.

Toss proved vital for the outcome of the series. India could not win the first test match after losing the toss and were on the backfoot and would have lost if not for the brilliant performances from Zaheer Khan with both bat and ball. Had Australia won that match, the story would have been different. So called Fab four or Five could not do anything in the Bangalore match after losing the toss. Fab Four performed only after getting out of the woods in the first test and then winning the toss in the rest

Facts:
1. Krezja was the most successful bowler for the match.
2. Ponting had Krezja at one end and the other end clarke and hussey.
3. It was quite some overs(10) ago that fast bowlers got wickets.
4. Even the last two wickets was captured by a spinner. (Krezja)
5. Another one was run out.
6. The next wicket also fell for krezja(Dhoni).

7. He had part timers bowl for 12 overs.

8. A few months ago, this became a master stroke when Clarke took wickets and India crumbled.

9. The only worthwhile wicket Watson took after this was of Bajji.

[opinions:] When Watson got Bajji, by the time India have crossed the river.
I would say Dhoni and Bajji kept a price on their wicket during the last session and they were fighting. All these comments about Ponting appears to be taking granted that Dhoni and Bhajji are bunnies of other Bowlers.

I would give due credit to Dhoni and Bajji.
They were n't tailenders, at least not this Bajji of recent times against Aus.