With paceman Glenn McGrath retired, it appears Ricky Ponting has taken on the role of making bold predictions about Australia regaining the Ashes from England with a 5-0 series sweep. "It's absolutely possible, there's no reason why not," the Australia captain told reporters yesterday at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, where he was meeting with Cricket Australia officials to map out preparations for the Ashes series starting November 25 in Brisbane.
"It's all in our hands," Ponting added. "It's how well we play and how well we take charge of different situations. "We've learned from a lot of the mistakes that we've made." McGrath, England's chief tormentor for much of the late nineties up until his retirement from Test cricket in January 2007, said ahead of the 2005 series in England that Australia would win 5-0. But Australia lost 2-1, giving England their first Ashes series victory since before Australia reclaimed the old urn under Allan Border in 1989.
Australia recovered from the 2005 series loss by winning the 2006/07 Ashes series at home 5-0. But England reclaimed bragging rights at home in 2009 with another 2-1 win. Ponting said his side has improved in the interim. "We know now that we're a more experienced and probably a better team now than we were then," Ponting said. "We put that together plus we're playing in our conditions. We hope to win this series and win it well."
Jonathan Trott, the England batsman, preparing for the third Test against Pakistan at The Oval tomorrow, responded to Ponting's comments on Sky Sports News yesterday, saying: " I've only played against them once [the victorious final Test last summer] and that game went pretty well, so I'll just leave it at that." Meanwhile, Zulqarnain Haider, the Pakistan wicketkeeper, will miss the remaining two Tests against England because of a broken finger.
Kamran Akmal will replace the 24-year-old for the third Test, which starts at The Oval tomorrow. * Agencies
