Former Australian skipper, Ricky Ponting on Tuesday said that the batting of Tim Paine and company has been below par. He made this statement after Australia lost the Boxing Day Test versus Ajinkya Rahane’s India on Day four. The Border-Gavaskar series now stands at 1-1.
Criticising the batting display by the Australian team, Ponting mentioned the way 200 odd runs in an innings cannot win Test matches. The Kangaroo batsmen have managed only 586 runs in the three complete innings they’ve batted. According to these figures, Australia has lost a wicket at margins of 19.5 runs.
While talking to cricket.com.au, the three-time World Cup winning captain said,“It’s all about partnerships and they haven’t had any partnerships through the first couple of games. The cracks are probably painted over from Adelaide. (Australia) made 191 there, 195 and 200 here. That’s not batting in Test match cricket. And the worry I’ve got is how long it takes them to get those runs. That’s my issue.”
He further mentioned that a run rate of two-and-a-half an over was poor. Not a single Aussie batsman could cross the 50-run mark in the second test match. Pointing asked the team to show character or like the 2018-19 tour, Paine will be seeing another series defeat at home.
“They’ve scored at two-and-a-half runs an over in Adelaide and here (in Melbourne) and they did (that) against India in the last series out here (and) that was also another losing series. They’ve got to show some more intent. They can’t be scared of getting out. They’ve got to go out there and bat and score runs and they’ve got to get them quicker than two-and-a-half runs an over because what we’ve seen from Adelaide to here, if they’re trying to apply themselves and bat for long periods of time they haven’t been good enough to do that. I think they need to have a good look at how they’re playing, a look at their personnel. They’ve got a lot of work to do. Whoever they pick in the next XI it’s going to be a great test of character for all of them.”
- The Indian team defeated Australia by 8 wickets, staging the series at 1-1
- Steve Smith has managed eight runs in his last four innings versus India
- Ponting said that the Australian team should focus at scoring runs at a quicker rate
Ponting believes, Steve Smith– who has merely scored 10 runs in the series so far– and his protege Marnus Labuschagne will have to take more responsibility. The latter has gotten starts– reaching 40 runs twice in the two test matches– but has failed to score big runs.
“We saw the last tour out here (in 2018-19) with Smith and Warner not being there how frail Australia looked then. Right now, Smith basically hasn’t been there, Warner hasn’t been there and Marnus has made a couple of 40s but had all sorts of luck and not been able to capitalise. It just goes to show how important they are,” Ricky Ponting added.
