While the beginning of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy series between India and Australia is still a few days away, it appears there has already been a war between Gautam Gambhir and Ricky Ponting. The India head coach had lashed out at Ponting for his comments regarding his attack on Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma and asked him to stick to his team. Now,Ponting has also reacted to Gambhir’s comments, which were made at a press conference before Team India’s departure to Australia, calling the coach a ‘prickly character’.
“I was stunned when I read the response. But knowing the coach, Gautam Gambhir, and the circumstances that he often finds himself in …,” he’s a pretty prickly character so it doesn’t surprise me that he was the one who shot back,” Ponting said during an appearance on 7News.
He also assured that his comments on Virat were not intended to be disrespectful or critical in any way. The great Australian cricketer is the optimistic one for the Indian batter who has struggled a bit in the recent past, as he is confident he will come back successfully in the venue where he has previously excelled.
“In no way was it an attempt to insult him (Kohli). As a matter of fact, I followed that with an observation that he had done quite well in Australia and that he would be very eager to do that again here…. I think Virat has concerns as well if he would be able to score as many hundreds as he has done in previous years,” he stated.
“It’s incredible how much can be dissected over little things, but he is a class act and has performed well over there in Australia before.”
In a pre-series press conference on Monday, Gambhir was asked to comment on Ricky Ponting’s remarks. Gambhir took on the Australian legend about his statements on Kohli and Rohit.
“Why does Ponting speak regarding Indian cricket?” Gambhir had said. “Let him worry about Australian cricket. I don’t care. They are (Kohli and Rohit) very strong will persons, done a lot for Indian cricket and will do more.”
In the press conference, Gambhir was still responding to Ponting’s weaker assertion about Kohli being in the team despite his awful Test statistics
“Recently I happened to glance at some number about Virat. It claimed that in the last five years he has managed to get just two Test hundreds. I found that hard to believe but if it is true then that is alarming,” Ponting had said. “Chances are, there wouldn’t be any other batsman who still plays international cricket at the top order and has managed only two Test match hundreds in five years.”
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