Ricky Ponting ponders over his future after Ashes loss
Australian captain Ricky Ponting has plummeted to new depths as a disappointing summer was sealed with another innings loss to England that has cost the hosts the Ashes for the second time in the running and the third time in the last
four series.
The hosts lost by an innings and 158 runs on day four of the Melbourne test which meant that the English take an unassailable 2-1 lead in the five match series. The best that the Aussies can do now is to avoid a series defeat at Sydney
which would not bring the Ashes back yet give them consolation of a drawn series.
In the midst of the doom and gloom surrounding the Aussie camp, captain Ricky Ponting is pondering over his future in the game which has given him superstar status around the world.
"The fact that I've lost those three series is disappointing for me," he said, slightly prematurely. "Hopefully I'm not only remembered as that guy, the guy that lost three Ashes series. There's lots of other great things I've been lucky
to be able to be part of as a player throughout my career. This result is not one of my proudest."
Ponting is second on Test cricket's run list with more than 12,000 runs to his name he also has an amazing tally of 39 test hundreds which is 11 behind the man at the top of the tree Sachin Tendulkar.
However Punter has had to endure a wretched series at home he has added only 113 in eight bats in this series, and he admits that his lack of form is one of the reasons for his team’s listless show against their greatest rivals.
In such a scenario Ponting is at odds about how long he would continue leading the test team yet he wants to play a role in Australia’s re-emergence in the post McGrath, Warne, Langer, Hayden and Gilchrist era.
On captaincy, he stated that it was the decision that the Australian Board and selectors had to take. "It's out of my control, I can't think too much about it," he said. "I've tried my hardest over the last couple of weeks to try to play
well and try to lead the team as well as possible. I've felt I've led the team as well as I can. I haven't performed the way I wanted to perform, but I certainly haven't done it without trying, that's for sure."
"Whatever decision I make, it's really important it's for the betterment of Australian cricket," he said. "I want to keep playing; I would love to keep leading the team. I still think I've got a lot to offer in both those regards."
"I probably haven't got much of a case at the moment," he said of hanging on to the captaincy. "I've got a lot of knowledge on the game, the fact that I've played 150 Tests and won 99 Test matches.
Despite an impressive record in all formats of the game Ponting is a lost soul the man who led http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Australia-c746 to two consecutive World Cup titles in 2007 and 2011 is not sure if he would be leading his team in its title defence that starts
in the Indian sub-continent in February next year.
Not helping matters due to the finger injury that he sustained during the Perth test match, the word is that the national selectors are expected to ease him away from the game. The first step in that direction is “resting” him for the
fifth and final test of the ongoing series that starts in Sydney from 2nd January.
Tags: