“You can’t blame the pitch” – Ricky Ponting slams Australian batsmen for the shoddy show in Melbourne

Ricky Ponting slammed the Australian batsmen for mediocre staging in the 2nd Test on Monday.

The two-time World Cup-winning captain remarked there are no demons in the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG) wicket.

Australian bowlers and most pundits had expected an ameliorated show from the batters in the second outing.

However, the bubble burst soon as they were bundled out for 200. Speaking to Channel Seven, Ricky Ponting blasted the performance as “very, very poor.”

“You can’t blame the pitch. The pitch has been absolutely perfect today. It’s a little bit of spin, yes, but you’d expect that. Day three of a Test Match. Very little on offer for the fast bowlers, but it’s just been poor batting. Very, very poor batting so far,” said Ricky Ponting.

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“It’s been one of the reasons, I think, that they’ve eventually got themselves out, playing rash shots. They haven’t been able to tick the scoreboard over on a regular enough basis. Pressure builds. When pressure builds, bad shots come,” added Ponting.

“I talked about it in the first innings as well particularly with the way they played Ravi Ashwin. They weren’t proactive against him. Yes, it’s been good bowling, but sometimes against the best bowlers, you have to take more risks as a batsman. For the sheer fact, they’re not going to bowl bad balls,” said Ricky Ponting.

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“The lesser skilled bowlers you can sit on all day because you know you’re going to one or two scoring opportunities an over, but Bumrah, Ashwin, Jadeja, even Siraj to a certain degree in this game, they don’t make many mistakes,” explained Ponting.

“They’ve actually forced the Australian batsman into making mistakes. When you’re just sitting there waiting for good bowlers to make mistakes, you’re basically a sitting duck,” Ricky Ponting concluded.

(With input from SportsKeeda)