Ricky Ponting
Ricky Ponting will hit the headlines of the Australian media after their dramatic loss over India in the quarter final of this edition of world cup. Three ashes defeats, losing two continuous CB series in successive finals, slipping the Border-Gavaskar trophy for the 2nd time, missing a semi-final of the world cup by a whisker and most importantly lack of runs in the kitty raises some serious concern for one of the greatest captain of the modern era.
One might wonder how does that man has been called so as “the greatest captain” after such shocking defeats. You can have a team which has around 5-6 legends playing on the park but to lead them is completely an enormous task on hand. Ricky Ponting is well known not for being a part of the Australian team for so many years but simply for leading a team with legends and establishing themselves as the “INVINCIBLES”. The Indian team had fab 4, along with the greatest Indian spinner Anil Kumble but still could peak great heights as the Aussies did. The reason being simple that no one could match the standards of Ponting. He started off his campaign as a skipper in 2002 and he was spot on to the task at hand. He won the tour series of South Africa thereby ending a glorious career of another legend Steve Waugh. It was a smooth sail from then on as Ricky took over complete dominance against every opposition. He bagged the 2003 ashes with a sparkling average of 52.12. But the team was buried with injury woes ahead of the World Cup scrapping the then #1 player Bevan and Watson.The spinning legend Shane Warne was sent off after failing a drugs test and things turned out worse when the Australian board got engaged in a cold war with Ricky for strongly backing out of form Symonds. But his decision proved vital as Symonds smashed 140 after the top order collapsed.Ponting saved his best for the finals when he tattered the Indian bowling scoring 140 of 121 balls and clinched his maiden world cup win as captain. He then marched on as full time captain and kicked off with a series win in India after 35 years. He won all the 5 matches in home soil winning 2-0 against Lankans and 3-0 against Pakistan. His redemption after 2005 ashes defeat was on track when he hammered England 5-0 in 2006 ashes series. To add to that, he clinched the Champions Trophy too the same year.
But however his downfall picked up after his attitude during the home tour against India and that led to his saying “It all started against India” after some successive failures. Now the road ahead for Ponting looks absurd and even the media trying to chuck out the skipper by raising new rumors, it’s high time that Ricky Ponting steps down graciously himself but not after scoring a scintillating ton in what looks like his last match of his extraordinary cricketing career.
Tags: Australia, Australian Media, Cricket, ICC Cricket World Cup 2011, Media, Ricky Ponting, World Cup
