Ricky Ponting wasn’t afraid to call a spade a spade following Australia’s disastrous exit from the 2026 T20 World Cup. Australia endured a group-stage ouster following defeats to Zimbabwe and Sri Lanka, with the Zimbabwe vs Ireland washout sealing their fate. Incidentally, Ponting was the captain when Australia suffered their only other league-stage elimination, in the 2009 edition in England.
The former captain was vocal about his concerns with this team, which was marred by injuries to Pat Cummins, Josh Hazlewood, and, to a certain extent, even Mitchell Marsh. The Australian captain did not feature in the game against Zimbabwe, which ended in an upset.
Ponting mentioned that he’s been the butt of all jokes, with fellow Indian broadcasters including Ravi Shastri and Sunil Gavaskar roasting him over Australia’s performance. That, however, is the least of Ponting’s concerns as he lamented the loss against Zimbabwe, which he claimed would go down as a huge missed opportunity.
“It’s been a really poor campaign, it has to be said. They had some injury concerns at the start with (Josh) Hazlewood and (Pat) Cummins being ruled out and then Tim David not available right at the start as well. But I think just losing to Zimbabwe like they did, that’s going to be the game that they’re going to think back and think like that’s our World Cup gone, there and then,” Ponting told the ICC.
“I’ve had a fair bit of ribbing, it has to be said, from a lot of Indian friends of mine over the last few days, but that’s part and parcel. You take the good with the bad and more often than not, I’ve been able to be the one that’s been able to send a cheeky message back and forth myself – but certainly not in this tournament”
‘No aura’
Addressing the issues plaguing this team, Ponting feels the current players lack the same gravitas as the players of his time. Ponting belongs to the era when the Aussies were labelled the invincibles, winning three World Cup trophies in a row and two Champions Trophy. But gone are the days when Australia would be a force to reckon with. Still unlike Ian Healy, who went on a rant, slamming Australia for ‘duping’ its fans, Ponting refused to go hard at this team.
“I think I said to you the other day that you look at that Australian team on paper, it just doesn’t look to have that sort of aura around it that a lot of other Australian teams have going into ICC events and World Cups. You need to have your best players and your most experienced players standing up and winning big moments for you in these tournaments if you want to go ahead and win and Australia haven’t had that.
“There’s just little areas that you have to win that Australia haven’t been able to win. As a past player and these WhatsApp groups that we’re on, we certainly don’t sit back and bash the current players or talk about them in a negative way when they don’t win. We just want to see our team do well. So, unfortunately, that hasn’t happened over the last couple of weeks. And that’s something that group of players has to live with,” he said.
