After a humiliating defeat in the first Test of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy against India, the Australian team are facing criticism from all over the world. From former players to the media, everyone is bashing Pat Cummins and co. for poor team selection and being unable to counter the Indian spin attack.
Coming to India, everyone has understood that the pitches will be spin-friendly, and so is Australia. They prepared well for ace India spinner Ravichandran Ashwin but failed to determine the real threat. The only Aussie who guessed it correctly was former captain Ricky Ponting.
A week before the match former Australia captain Ricky Ponting knew which Indian player would turn into a “nightmare” for visitors. The Indian played a crucial part in the series’ opening Test match, proving the Australia legend was correct. The Indian star was none other than Ravindra Jadeja, who turned out to be the player of the match for his all-round performance.
Coming to the first game, Aussies were concerned about Ravichandran Ashwin, but, on the very first day, Jadeja proved to be a nightmare for them. India all-rounder clinched five wickets in the first innings to restrict visitors to a below-par total of 177.
Speaking about the same in a cricket show, Ponting said, “I had seen his return to first-class cricket last week and he got some 11 wickets or something. As soon as I saw that I knew Aussies were in for a nightmare.”
Ricky Ponting praises Ravindra Jadeja’s bowling skills
Ponting further analyzed Jadeja’s bowling action and pointed out his identical balls which work differently for right-handers. He said,
“Because of how he bowls on those sort of wickets – the pace that he bowls, the line that he bowls to right-handers in particular, where he is pitching the ball on the stumps all the time, and one would turn and one will slide on, like we saw, with the dismissal of Steven Smith today. I mean they’re two identical deliveries. One just happened to turn and the other one went straight on and went back through the gate and bowled him.”
Notably, after the injury, Jadeja made his comeback to competitive cricket in Ranji Trophy last month. He played a game for Saurashtra against Tamil Nadu and took 8 wickets in the match. Later, he was named into the Indian squad and made his international comeback after five months.
