Ashes Preview: England set for a real battle at Gabba – Australia captain Ricky Ponting
With the Ashes series barely a fortnight away, the captain of the Australian team Ricky Ponting has (re?)started the war of words as he tries to assert his team’s supremacy over the touring English team.
Ponting claimed in an interview for the Australian media that the POMS are in for a real battle in the opening Test match of the five-match series.
The match is set to take place on what Ponting believes is the toughest wicket for touring teams in Australia, the Gabba in Brisbane.
"With just a normal Brisbane wicket, visiting teams find it hard to come to terms with just how different it is up there, our record there is unbelievably good and we want to make sure we continue that on," Ponting said.
"There's been a lot made of England's preparation, the fact that they're here early and they're playing lots of games, but they don't play a match at the Gabba before the first Test. They'll definitely still find it hard to come to grips with what they're confronted with in Brisbane day one.
"In my mind it's been the best cricket wicket in Australia for as long as I've been playing the game," Ponting said. "There's always something in it for everyone. The fast bowlers always get something out of it, it spins late in the game, and it's a great place to bat once you get in."
The man known as Punter in the Australian media has a lot on his plate ahead of the biggest battle in Test cricket. His team has endured a woeful run in all formats of the game and just ended one of their poorest runs in modern times with a 9-wicket win over the Sri Lankans in the last ODI at Brisbane.
However, the team lost the three-match series 1-2, besides losing the one-off T20 match at Perth.
Before that, they had lost one ODI and two Test matches that were played in http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Pakistan-c755 in the first Test match of the two-match neutral series at Lord’s.
The next Test match saw them crashing down to earth as they went down by 3 wickets after being blown away for 88 runs on day one of the Test played at Headingley, Leeds.
Meanwhile, the English squad is honing its skills before the commencement of the battle at Gabba.
The squad, under the captaincy of Andrew Strauss, is raring to go; there is good news emanating from the camp as the two leading bowlers James Anderson and Graeme Swann have recovered from the injuries that they sustained during the preparation for the series.
The English squad is also pinning its hope on young fast bowler Steven Finn, who was named ICC’s Emerging Player of the Year for 2009-10.
The tall right-armer is expected to come in first change in the bowling line-up behind James Anderson and Stuart Broad.
He can extract disconcerting bounce from a good length and thus the Gabba is a surface he can create a lot of damage on.
The POMS would be relying on their first choice attack of Anderson, Broad, Finn and Swann to continue their golden run in Test cricket. The quartet was in top form in the English summer and easily dismantled the low-on-quality batting line-ups of Pakistan and http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Bangladesh-c747 in the six Tests played in the home season.
The first Ashes Test match starts on the 25th of this month; the second would take place at the Adelaide Oval, third at Perth’s http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Western-Australia-c865 Cricket Association Ground, fourth at the Melbourne Cricket Ground while the fifth and final Test in the series is due to take place at the Sydney Cricket Ground.
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