the alleged spinner<\/a> in the Australian team.<\/p>\nIndia was chasing 207 to win on the final day of the Test. No team had ever scored that number of runs on the Bangalore wicket to win a Test until that day. Yet India did, with ease. The two Indian spinners, Harbhajan Singh and Pravin Ojha, had helped to bundle out Australia for 223 in its second innings. Both obtained a great deal of purchase from the wicket. The Indian fast bowlers obtained plenty of reverse swing. The Australian bowlers could not do a thing to trouble the Indians.<\/p>\n
Australia is now ranked fifth among the nine countries that play Test cricket. It is below India, South Africa, Sri Lanka and even England. Calls are now starting for Ponting’s head. Warne’s comments thus assume a lot of significance.<\/p>\n
One reason for Warne’s utterances may be the fact that Steve Smith, the spinner who has Warne’s backing, is yet to be picked for a Test ahead of Hauritz. This, despite the fact that in the first Test of the series against India, we had the peculiar situation of India fighting against the odds to chase down a total of 216 on the final day and Hauritz not bowling even though the pitch was taking turn. What made it even more odd was the fact that Smith was not in the team and Ponting’s spinner of choice was the occasional trundler Marcus North.<\/p>\n
Australia rarely picks two spinners. Hence when one man is picked, it is assumed that he is the prime spin talent in the country. Hauritz, sadly, is not up to the mark; he is the poor man’s spinner and does not deserve to play. Ponting does not know how to handle him and that shows. Ponting’s failures are beginning to affect his batting as well.<\/p>\n
The next opponent for Australia is the old foe – England. The Ashes which England holds are up for grabs in the Test series that begins in November. That is a matter for even more worry. Ponting won the last home series for the Ashes but promptly lost the next series in England. This was a repeat, as he had also lost the 2005 series.<\/p>\n
A loss at home may well mean the loss of the captaincy as well. That could be a blessing for Ponting as he still has a lot to give as a batsman. He is still a class act in full flow. Whether he will be able to function under another captain remains to be seen. But he would do Australian cricket a service by stepping down and playing as a batsman instead.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
SHANE Warne, the Australian leg-spinner, was always keen to be captain of the national cricket team. Unfortunately, the Australian cricket administrators are obsessed with the idea that a man who leads the country’s cricket team should also be a saint. Warne did not get the job because of his numerous sexual peccadilloes and Ricky Ponting … <\/p>\n
Continue reading “Australia’s cricketing disaster”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3,5,2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-68","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-australia","category-cricket","category-india"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":5021,"url":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/?p=5021","url_meta":{"origin":68,"position":0},"title":"Vale Shane Warne, the man who revived spin bowling","date":"March 5, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"The master has gone. Spin legend Shane Warne bows out, bowled for 52. Australian leg-spinner Shane Warne has shuffled off the mortal coil. He died in Thailand on Friday at the age of 52, felled by a suspected heart attack. The leg-spinner arrived on the international scene in 1992, a\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Ashes"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i1.wp.com\/sams-blog.com\/wp-content\/sams-blog.com\/2022\/03\/warne.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":36,"url":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/?p=36","url_meta":{"origin":68,"position":1},"title":"How did Nathan Hauritz ever get into the Australian team?","date":"December 31, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"YESTERDAY, for the first time in his first-class cricket career, Nathan Hauritz, an alleged off-spinner from New South Wales who is in the Australian team, took five wickets in an innings. I use the word alleged because I was used to be able to turn the ball more when I\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Australia"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5053,"url":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/?p=5053","url_meta":{"origin":68,"position":2},"title":"Don't go overboard with the sentiments, Warne was just another flawed human being","date":"March 9, 2022","format":false,"excerpt":"There is an unwritten rule in most human societies that one does not speak ill of the dead. You can be the worst murderer, thief, rapist or sociopath and beat your wife every day of the week, but the moment you die, you have to be treated as some kind\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Alcohol"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/sams-blog.com\/wp-content\/sams-blog.com\/2022\/03\/hypocrisy-clipart-9.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":3715,"url":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/?p=3715","url_meta":{"origin":68,"position":3},"title":"Does Steve Smith believe that spin can win matches?","date":"January 16, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"As Australia mentally prepares for a gruelling tour of India, one curious characteristic of captain Stephen Smith is being ignored. This is Smith's attitude towards spin and spinners when it comes to any form of cricket. In India, any international team that wants to win a Test series must have\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Australia"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2438,"url":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/?p=2438","url_meta":{"origin":68,"position":4},"title":"Xenophobes in Australia about to choke on their cornflakes","date":"February 27, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"THE xenophobes in Australia \u2014 and that's a goodly proportion of the population \u2014 will find themselves in a difficult position if Fawad Ahmed is granted citizenship and selected to play for Australia in the Ashes cricket series against England later this year. You see, Ahmed is an asylum-seeker from\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Asylum-seekers"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":64,"url":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/?p=64","url_meta":{"origin":68,"position":5},"title":"Why Ricky Ponting should be sacked","date":"July 22, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"RICKY Ponting is one of the best cricketers in the world to watch when he is on song. The man has played 145 Tests, captained Australia since 2004 and is a pugnacious fighter all the way. Despite all this experience and these attributes, Ponting does not deserve to captain the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Australia"","img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=68"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=68"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=68"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sams-blog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=68"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}