Quote:
Originally Posted by Aurelius  Whenever the opposition starts going along nicely and is attacking, Ponting goes on the defensive. Example- when Jacob Oram made that century in Brisbane, he didn't try to get him out. Rather he put everyone on the boundary and tried to get him off strike to have a crack at Vettori- a strategy that didn't work.
Another example- Adelaide last year. Ian Bell comes to the crease, immediately lofts Warne over mid off for four. What does Ponting do? Drops the mid off down to a long off, to a batsman fresh to the crease. A more aggressive captain would have kept him up and tried to encourage him to go over the top again- but he took the defensive option. |
I'd agree he's unquestionably a far more defensive captain than Waugh but personally I don't view this a failing of Ponting. The best way of taking wickets in the modern game is to stop batsmen scoring and wait for the mistake and whilst setting conservative fields may not look as sexy (for want of a better word
) as Waugh's ultra aggressive 4 slips 2 gullys, bat pad, leg gully e.t.c it's arguably more effective and the number one reason that Ponting was able to beat India away. He was willing to adapt his sides strategy to the situation (the way he worked out Dravid was just brilliant planning and execution) something that Waugh for all his many qualities as captain and leader wasn't. Of course had Waugh been captain in 2005 we simply wouldn't have won the Ashes because he had that aura of invincibility over England and wouldn't have allowed us up off the canvas after Lords (though I reckon he still would have bowled first at Edgebaston) but that's just the solitary series and one Ashes loss really shouldn't define Ponting's tenure as captain. As one loss in India (hwere had Ponting been at the helm the result I suspect would have been different) doesn't seem to have defined Waugh's.
The final day of the Adelaide test you mentioned for me summed up everything that's good about Ponting as a captain. I remember Chappell droning on and on for the first 40 minutes about the fields Ponting was setting with only a couple of slips and men back on the cover fence for both Clark and Warne but the point was England didn't get away and the first 7 overs brought something like 5 singles and forced Strauss to attempt something way out of his comfort zone and got Koertzened which led to the collapse as Warne and co began to squeeze the life out of England. Had Waugh been captain he would have tried to bully England with the over the top field placings (and Lee who is a far better bowler under Ponting's leadership would have been used to buy wickets rather than build pressure) and tried to blast the English batsmen out which on such a slow dead track simply wouldn't have worked.