Ricky Ponting is still playing international cricket. So a testimonial seems like an odd thing to do.
Instead here is a video of Ricky Ponting with Ben Affleck hair and his goatee.
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Clarke won’t captain a team with Ponting in it
That isn’t my statement, although I also thought it was true before today.
That was a headline from 31st of December.
The question someone asked Michael Clarke was if he would captain Australia with Ponting in it.
“No. I’ve always said from day one Ricky Ponting is my leader, my captain, and I’m certain he’ll be back captaining ASAP.”
What has changed in that time.
Well, Ricky Ponting is now not his leader, because he has stepped down.
Is it that simple.
Did Michael Clarke really mean,
“No. Ricky is my captain now, and while he is captain I can’t be, because we both can’t be captains at the same time. We both can’t be sitting in the same chair.”
Or did he mean,
“I’ll never captain Ricky, he scares me to death.”
Or even,
“I won’t captain him until he makes a public statement retiring from the job but wants to stay on batting.”
Now, because of Ricky’s semi retirement, Clarke is going to take over a team with Ponting in it. Probably.
The person who told him off in Perth, all of three tests ago, the man who was default coach, default selector, and iron fisted captaining grouch and one of the greatest players the country as produced.
You could understand why someone like Clarke wouldn’t want to captain Ponting.
Yet now Ponting has stepped down from the top job and thrown the ball back into Clarke’s court.
What will Clarke do?
Can he walk into the job, swing his power around and say, sorry old man, this is the future, you are the past, thanks, but no thanks.
Or should he try and look like he doesn’t give a shit about Ricky, that he has hardly noticed Ricky even exists, and that Ricky is just another face in the crowd that Michael Clarke needs to mould in order to bring Australia back to glory.
The third option is for Clarke to get hypnotised and so that instead of seeing Ponting he sees Walter Matthau grumbling in the corner of the changeroom.
I think it’s great that Ponting thinks so much of Clarke that he is willing to really test him at the start of his reign as captain.
Ponting half retires
There was a time when you’d retire.
Now it is not that simple.
Sometimes you retire at the end of a series.
Sometimes you retire from just one form of cricket.
Sometimes you retire from one facet of the game.
That is what Ponting has done.
Is it for the best of Australian cricket, probably not.
Is it for the best of Ricky Ponting, probably.
Does it mean I’ll write an entire post on it, it seems unlikely.
In stepping down from the captaincy Ponting has taken a half measure for Australian cricket. Three of their top six are still over 35. The new captain doesn’t just have to have the most scrutinised sporting job in Australia, he also has the old boss sitting next to him. And there is no guarantee that retiring from the captaincy will make Ponting’s form come back.
Ponting has retired from T20 cricket and captaincy, he’s doing this shit in instalments, and when he gets to section four I’ll write a whole post.
Ricky, take a bow
Ricky could have just stayed and waited to die in this game.
Instead he gave it one last go. That’s Ricky.
With no legs, and his bloody stumps leaking blood all over the place, Ricky pulled ten largely lifeless bodies out of the dungeon, up the stairs, past the boobie trapped shot guns, over the crocodile infested moat and truck he found in the woods.
It was an amazing effort considering how close he was to death as well.
The problem for Ricky was that there were no keys to the truck.
He was just stuck there with the ten other blokes waiting for the killers to come and end him.
The waiting looked like it pained him, but when this all ended, as much as he fought to survive, he must have felt some relief.
Ricky, it’s over, there’s nothing left. You can leave now, it’s ok, we won’t mind. Your effort was special,yet it just doesn’t matter anymore. This is no longer your problem. There is now nothing you can do other than retire. If you can drag out a hundred with a broken finger and still lose comfortably there is nothing left for you to do here. It’s someone else’s job. No one said you had to keep playing until Australia gets good again, you’re entitled to retiring as much as anyone else with 3 world cups, a host of series victories and some demon batting performances.
Your work here is all done, get a gold watch off James Sutherland, ask Channel 9 for a job and play a bit of celebrity golf.
Ricky, thanks and good luck in the future.
Let the next guy try and drag his team mates out of the dungeon while your enjoying a cold one in a corporate box.
TV ruins cricket, Ponting fights back
I think everyone would agree TV has ruined that cricket.
The UDRS, Tony Greig, Kerry Packer, Lalit Modi, tracer bullets and crappy cricket merchandise have been haunting us for years.
Without TV, cricket would be pure and right, a utopian sport of awesomeness.
With TV, cricket is a dreary repetitive whore who is always asking for money and regularly leaving you without climax or cuddles.
There is no doubt that TV is the worst thing to happen to cricket since Don Bradman.
I’ve always said it, there’s probably a facebook group about it.
You know I’m right, cricket has been ruined by the professionalism TV has brought in, our beautiful gentleman’s game has been blighted by microphones in stumps and up players.
We now hear grunts, swears and general boo boos, and he third wall has been brought down.
Cricket is now naked, in HD, standing before us, ever pore and orifice wide open, and we’re all to blame.
While I just complain about it, Ricky Ponting does something about it.
He’s not content lazily whining about TV, he’s hitting back.
While it is easy to misconstrue his attack on the TV in the changerooms as the actions of a fading superstar who no longer understands why he can’t perform the way he once did, it is actually attack on the symbolism of TV itself.
Ponting didn’t attack the TV out of frustration after a run out, he did it because of the way TV has ruined our great game.
So instead of taking the piss out of Ponting, we should all thank him as he has launched the first attack on this beast that has spent years greedily sucking on the wonderful teat of our great game.
Support Ponting, smash your TV with a cricket bat.
Fight the power button.
Ricky, Natalie and I
You have your youth as long as you can hold onto it, unless you are one of those types who were born 32 years old. For the rest of us we cling onto objects and icons to stay young. The two that always stood out for me were Ricky Ponting and Natalie Portman.
Ponting started his test career when I was 16. He was the young pup way before there was even a pup.
I followed his career through dodgy LBWs at the WACA, scratchy knocks at number three, not wearing a helmet to face Curtly, a fight with a fence at Sydney, a fight with someone else in Sydney, a dropping from the team, that terrible goatee, getting wickets with gentle outswing, the face of Milk in Tasmania, the centuries coming in, vice captaincy, bhajji, runs, world cup finals, grumpiness, backing his team, captaincy, bad captaincy, over rate problems, losing an ashes, winning more world cups, more runs, more bad captaincy, losing faith in spin, losing another ashes, losing the number one spot, winning a pointless trophy, losing cricket matches to every one, and losing the Ashes again. I saw the best and worst of him.
Ponting and I have a few similarities, leaving school early, flirting with the idea of becoming groundsmen, quick to anger, hugely defensive when criticized and painfully working class upbringings. Even with this we’re probably nothing alike, and I doubt we’d ever be friends, but there is some sort of link there from me watching him for half my life.
As a batsman he was one of the best I have seen, or will ever see. When he was in control of his game, he was in control of the test match. He didn’t bat for time or records, he batted for his team, and there are few champion batsmen like that.
As a captain he got better as his team got worse. When he started he was a confused man with a lot of help from others, then he learnt how to trust himself and became a modern test captain with little flair, trust in his bowlers or need to attack.
On the last day of the boxing day test he walked off the ground to the foo fighters singing “there goes my hero”. At the time the song was being played for the English team as they sprinkled their way around the ground to bathe in the glory that Ponting has not seen for a long time.
The song wasn’t for Ponting, he probably didn’t even here it being played, but for so many fans of Australian cricket you couldn’t have picked a better song. Ponting will always have something that Michael Clarke, or any of the next generations of captains, won’t have. Aussie cricket fans felt like he was one of them. Even if they didn’t like what he said or did, they had that same bond with Ponting that I felt. For so many they felt an instant connection with them that never left.
When he played the worst shot I’ve seen from him the day before, I felt sick, not bullshit sick, but really ill. My stomach tore up, I got a headache, and wished I was somewhere else. I thought that was the last time I’d see him bat in a test match.
For years I have abused him for his captaincy, boy’s club, misuse of bowlers, and the bubble he lives in. I’ve called him the hairy armed troll, doubted that he wanted to win as much as he said he did, and got angry with so much of what he had to say. As a captain, I could never get completely behind him, so I wouldn’t miss that.
It was as a batsman I’d miss him. From the first ball I saw him face I’ve always treasured watching him bat. His batting is Australia to me. Not Australian cricket, but all of Australia. You couldn’t see Ponting bat and think he was from anywhere else. His batting says more about Australia than the national anthem or Australia day. It is my Australia.
There will be those who pick Trumper, Ponsford, Harvey, Bradman, Border or Waugh, but for better or worse, Ponting is mine. We picked each other. He was my Australia, the best and worst of it. The Australia I love and despise.
At about the same time Ponting did a dirty drag on, Natalie Portman’s pregnancy was tweeted around the globe.
Portman and Ponting really came into my life at about the same time. In many ways I wanted to be with one and wanted to be the other. Those days are long gone.
Portman’s pregnancy didn’t really affect me at all. Ponting’s bad shot and exit from the G hurt me. This was my ground, and I felt like a part of me was leaving it for the last time.
Ponting might be back in test cricket, he could even play again at the G a few more times. He is someone who I’d never write off, but the best of him is gone. I felt older when he went out than I ever have in my life. The Ponting I grew up with doesn’t exist.
twas the night before boxing day…
‘Twas the night before Boxing day, when all through the house
Not a creature was stirring, not even a Strauss;
The bats were knocked in and oiled with care,
In hopes that Mark Nicholas would never be there;
The children were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of cover drives danced in their heads;
And Richie is his jacket, and Punter in his cap,
Had just settled down for a long summer’s nap,
When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter,
Punter sprang from the bed to see what was the matter.
Away to the window he flew like a flash,
Tore open the shutters and threw up the sash.
When, what to Punter’s squinty eyes should appear,
But an Ian Chappell, and a barrel of beer,
Chappelli’s mouth was so lively and quick,
“Open up you little dick”.
Then he yelled and the others came,
And he whistled, and shouted, and called them by name;
“Now, Bill! now, Steve! now, Mark and Bob!
On, Kim! on Graham! on, Greg and AB!
To the top of the porch! to the top of the wall!
Now drink away! Drink away! drink away all!”
They drank so fast it was if they flew,
Laughing and abusing Mark Nicholas too.
And then, in a twinkling, Punter heard on the roof
The prancing and pawing of each little hoof.
As Punter drew in his head, and was turning around,
Down the chimney Mark Nicholas came with a hound.
He was dressed all in trendy clothes from his head to his foot,
And his body hair had long since gone caput;
A bundle of baggage he had flung on his back,
And he looked like metro with a fresh shaved sack.
He was skinny and shady and hung like an elf,
And Punter laughed when he saw him, in spite of himself;
A wink of his eye and a twist of his head,
He let punter know he had nothing to dread;
He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work,
And started tweeting platitudes like a complete jerk,
And then Chappelli punched his nose,
And the others stood around him, trying to impose;
He sprang to his car, as the blood ran out,
And young pup cried like a small scout.
But I heard him exclaim, ere he drove out of sight,
“Happy Boxing day to all, I’ll captain Australia out of spite.”
ashes merchandise fail
I understand that the ashes is a big series that people want to make money off, and I understand the appeal of bobble heads, but in what world does this look like Ricky Ponting?
KP sort of looks like KP if he was trying to look like Guy Fawkes.
But, Ricky, well, he looks more like Josh Hazelwood’s ventriloquists dummy.
It should also be noticed that KP is not the captain of England.
I only say that incase Adidas didn’t know.
If you know who this “ricky” doll has been based on, feel free to link to that person in the comments.
Ponting gets momentum
Ponting does like to make a point.
Whether it is with a fuck you hundred or a 400 page diary in which he reiterates points he has made earlier, the man likes you to know exactly what he wants you to know.
Ponting will tell the press that it wasn’t just because of his bowlers that England made a kabillion runs for the loss of only one wicket, just so he had evidence, he went about scoring as quick as he could.
It was like a child saying, “look, see, I told you, I bloody told you it was the pitch”.
As if by making runs and pointing this out to the press, everyone will ignore that Mitchell bowled like I synchronize dive. And the rest of the attack didn’t make him look that bad.
Still, if your bowlers have embarrassed you, it is nice of the opposition captain to let you bash them around for a bit.
On the 27th of December, this Gabba pitch will start breaking up. They should bring the aussies back then just to see if it was the pitch, or they really are that shit.
By then, they might have won or lost the ashes.
The good thing for Ponting and Strauss is that now neither of them will have nightmares about losing 5-0.
Their loss will now not be a psychological bad number, and I’m sure that will calm them both down.
At this stage in the ashes, everyone talks about momentum.
The momentum is with Australia as they were smashing England around at the end if the match, they were momentuming all over England’s face.
From what I can tell from any number of experts, that is how momentum works, isn’t it?
So Australia are odds on to win the next test. You heard it hear first.
