Sydney: A “shocked” Ricky Ponting is finding it hard to believe how India’s “A team” came back to heart Australia in the recently-concluded Test series in their own backyard despite losing the opening match comprehensively.
Down with a series of injuries, India competed without many a key players, including the captain and frontline bowling attack. Yet, the Ajinkya Rahane-led side overwhelmed Australia by three wickets in the final and fourth Test at the Gabba, where the hosts had not lost a match in the last 32 years.
“I’m quite shocked that Australia weren’t quite good enough to win this series. The cold hard facts of it are pretty much that was the India A team that played this Test match and still won,” Ponting told cricket.com.au.
“Considering everything the Indian team has been through in the last five or six weeks, with the captain leaving, all the injuries they’ve had, they’ve been through 20 players, (Australia) have been at full-strength, bar Davey (Warner) missing early on, so it’s really hard to comprehend.
“It’s probably not even (India’s) second-picked team because you think of Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Ishant Sharma and those guys who didn’t even make it out here. Rohit Sharma turns up for the last two Test matches only.”
Ponting said India won all the key moments throughout the series and that was the difference between the two sides.
