Ponting blames himself for India loss

Ponting takes blame for team’s humiliating 2-0 Test series defeat to India, saying he should have scored more runs.

BANGALORE: Australia captain Ricky Ponting has taken the blame for his team’s humiliating 2-0 Test series defeat to India, saying he should have scored more runs.

Ponting passed the half-century mark in three of his four innings, but did not play a match-winning knock, unlike Indian superstar Sachin Tendulkar, who emerged the player of the series.

Tendulkar compiled 403 runs in the series at an average of 134.33, including a first innings 214 in the second Test in Bangalore. Ponting, in contrast, returned with 224 runs at an average of 56, a creditable effort by any standards except in the eyes of the Australian captain himself.

“I don’t feel like I did my bit with the bat,” said Ponting, the second highest run-scorer in Test cricket with 12,250 runs, behind Tendulkar’s record tally of 14,240. “When you get in and make 60 or 70, you expect to go on and make big scores. Tendulkar did it, he went on to make 200. If I had made 200 in the first innings, the result might have been different. We’ve all got to be harsh on ourselves.

“Three out of the four innings in the 70s is not good enough from me. I am as disappointed with the way I played as anybody else. When you get those starts, you have to capitalise.”

Published in The Express Tribune, October 15^th, 2010.