Southern Spice – Sports Entertainment

SYDNEY: Unfavourable stats stare at Ricky Ponting when he sits down to plan his strategy for the four-Test series against India. The Australian captain knows that it would take some doing to retain the Border-Gavaskar Trophy this time around.

Ponting is leading a side with only four players of his 14-member squad having played Test cricket in India. But he has the best record of all Australian captains. In 44 Tests he has lost only four Tests, importantly two of them have been against India. One of these was the only match he played on the previous Test tour four years ago, reports The Australian.

Ponting missed the first three matches on the 2004 tour through injury and Adam Gilchrist led the Australia side to cross what Steve Waugh said was the ‘Final Frontier’ by winning the first Test series in India for 35 years. Ponting led in the last Test only to lose narrowly on a dreadful pitch.

The other loss against India under Ponting came during the third Test last summer in Perth before Australia drew the final Test in Adelaide to seal a difficult 2-1 series victory.