Ponting under heavy pressure as a captain as well as a batsman!

After the first and second day of first test at Bangalore, nothing seems to be going in favour of australian captain Ricky Ponting. He is under a lot of pressure for his batting and for his captaincy also. Ricky Ponting never made good scores here in India. But on the first test, when he scored the first century for Australia, it was imagined that he has gone through the patches of his career and now able to score freely of the Indian attack. But to his dismay, all went wrong horribly in the seconf innings itself. Only Watson could stand against the formidable Indian attack in the second innings of the first test. India almost sneaked the first test under the nose of the Australians.

But it became certain in the second test on the first day itself. Both Sourav and Sachin playing splendid innings made him look like a dumb head with the burden of captaincy. He never got the courage of attacking any Indian pair. He gave them time to settle down and then expecting them to throw their wickets away. He put men on the boundary even with the new ball. That was the worst part of his captaincy till now. Apart from his spinner, all the remaining bowlers are very good fast bowlers. But instead of attacking the Indians with full flow, he tried to defend and that has cost him the second test match.

His batting looked extreamly helpless against the attack of Ishant Sharma. Apart from the first innings, Ishant claimed him three times cheaply. That’s been one of the biggest problems of Australians of late in this series. The other problem this captain is having is the failure of Hayden and fast bowler Brett Lee. Haden has been constantly struggling against the moving ball of Zaheer Khan and the outburst was shown in the second innings of the Mohali test. His anger made him fall in the second innings. Indians seems to have a plan going against Lee. They never try to hit him until the ball is there to hit. And they are very keen to use his pace rather than forcing a big drive.

Now Ponting as a captain is under lot of pressure as his team fears to lose the Border-Gavaskar trophy. As a batsman his problems are heavy against the tall fast bowler Ishant. He has to solve these problems as soon as possible before this series gets over.

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Kumble will be under pressure when India will face Australia at Kotla ground, Delhi!

One of the unfortunate people to miss the second test was the captain of India. Anil Kumble missed the second test due to a shoulder injury. This injury cost him the match. He had to sit in the bench and watch the players to make toil Aussies hard on the field.

Again he had to rest in the ac room while his team mates gave the Australians a torrid time out there while they were batting. But now he is determined to get back to cricket in the upcoming test at his favorite hunting ground Firozshah Kotla, Delhi. Anil Kumble has been a legend in the Indian cricket. And his favorite hunting ground is the Kotla ground at Delhi.

Here he has taken more than 50 wickets in six test at an average of less than his career’s overall. The best of his performances, of course the 10 wicket haul came in this ground way back in the late 90s. In that day he ruined Pakistan with his deadly spin bowling. In the recent times, Kumble has been going in a rough patch.

He went wicket less in the first test against Australia even in the second innings of the game. He never looked in comfort. He gave away too many loose deliveries to score off. This time there would be pressure on him as the selectors has seen the performance of Dhoni as a captain in tests. And his batting capabilities have refined in the captaincy.

At the same time the ruining of senior players are going on in the BCCI to inject fresh blood. So this will be a real test for Kumble who has more than 600 test wickets in his bag. One more aspect should be noticed here.

Inclusion of Kumble would mean that Amit Mishra has to sit out. This is again a test for the selectors whether to give preference to the old war horse or to the new buzzing talent who bowled superbly against a formidable Australian side.

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