Australian World Cup-winning captain Ricky Ponting compared star batter Travis Head with modern-day great of the game Adam Gilchrist in the present Australian team following his brilliant century against India in the Ultimate World Test Championship on Wednesday to put their side in a comfortable position at the end of Day 1.
The Australian southpaw walked on to bat on a tricky wicket, as the Aussies were 76-3, as he played with authority right from the start of his innings taking on the Indian pacers, to take the opponents by surprise with exploits with the bat alongside his Steve Smith in Kennington, Oval.
Speaking on ICC, Cricketer-turned-commentator Ricky Ponting hailed Travis Head for batting at such a high strike rate taking on the bowlers just like country-mate Adam Gilchrist, who is known for impetus in the middle order for the mighty Australian team during his playing days and highlighted the fact that Head has the highest among the top run-getter in World Test Championship Cycle (2021-23).
“He probably is (similar to Gilchrist) In fact he is probably scoring quicker now than Gilly probably ever did. His strike rate through this (World Test Championship) qualification period is 81, which is higher than anyone else in the world to have scored more than 500 runs”.
“His confidence is growing by the game, his strike rate keeps going up, he hits boundaries early on in his innings which puts pressure back on the bowlers which is what you want from your middle order players, and his last two years have been quite remarkable.”
Travis Head and Steve Smith batted brilliantly in the middle overs to put their team in the driver’s seat 327-3 at the end of day 1. The Left-handed batter produced a counter-attacking in the middle overs, as he scored his first overseas century at a good strike rate and will look to continue his batting going into the important Day 2.
It Looks Like It Was A Mistake From Them By Playing The Four Seamers – Ricky Ponting
Ricky Ponting believes that the pitch might offer some turn as the game progresses and reckons that Ashwin would have been the perfect bowler for India, especially with the number of left-handers present in the Australian batting lineup, and feels that the Indian team has made mistake by the dropping Ashwin in favour of playing four pacers in the team.
“As this game goes on, I have got no doubt that there is going to be a turn, Australia have got a lot of left-handers in their batting line-up which Ashwin would have been perfectly suited for. So far for me, it looks like it was a mistake from them by playing the four-seamers, but we will see how the game pans out,” Ricky Ponting added.
The Tamil Nadu all-rounder was overlooked in the team in favour of Shardul Thakur for the much-awaited game. Ashwin is India’s second-highest wicket-taker in Test cricket of all time – 474 wickets at 23.93 – only behind Anil Kumble, but could not find a place in the team for the Ultimate test in England