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Ricky Ponting maintains there is no problem with the Australian cricket team’s behaviour despite pointed criticism from ICC appeals commissioner Albie Sachs.
Though Sachs’ judgement on the Gautam Gambhir case upheld the verdict to suspend the Indian opener for elbowing Shane Watson, the South African justice said he was “not without sympathy” for Gambhir.
He accepted Gambhir was “the victim of prolonged and persistent verbal abuse by members of the Australian team, culminating in a moment of anger that led to his unfortunate lapse”.
Gambhir did not help his cause by responding with similar retorts to Watson, prior to raising his elbow, but Sachs said that the game needed to move away from ugly sledging scenes.
“It is not only physical argy-bargy that must be minimised. Constant verbal assaults are also unbecoming, and also bring the game into disrepute, the more so if their intention is to break the player’s concentration and provoke a loss of temper,” Sachs wrote.
“To my mind, these ‘verbals’ as they are euphemistically called, whether they involve swearing or not, provide a kind of tension and aggression inconsistent with the spirit of cricket.”
Ponting though was adamant that with a couple of notable exceptions, his players were well within their rights to engage in plenty of on-field talk, something he said match referee Chris Broad acknowledged.
“The umpires are out there adjudicating on what they see and as we saw as the game went on if anything happened between bowler and batsman they were pretty quick to get on to the captains,” Ponting said.
“As far as I’m concerned Broad has made it very clear to the players there is an acceptable level of banter on the field and he’s happy for that to be the case and I’m always happy for that to be the case because I think that’s part and parcel of international sport, not just cricket.”
When asked whether or not it was time for players to keep their mouths closed, Ponting was blunt in his opposition to any such thought.
“No, I don’t think that’s the way the game should be played, I don’t think it’s ever been played that way,” he said.
“There’s a lot more made of it from certain parts of the media than needs to be, as we’ve seen through this series it’s been anytime any player has opened his mouth at all it’s been a negative thing.
“I know at different times on the field I’ve had quite a lot of good, fun banter with Gambhir and (Sourav) Ganguly and those guys and pretty sure that’s not been reported.
“In Australia there was a lot made of some instances and there’s been a lot made of some instances here that probably haven’t been that huge.”
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