Ponting's Revenge

I always knew the Aussies would bounce back from 2005...and boy have they. I am so tired having stayed the distance last night to watch the brutal destruction of England. It came as a surprise to everyone that RP choose not to enforce the follow on but looking back now it really shouldn't have been a surprise.

You see the situation...England are now 626 runs adrift. I think that RP will bat on til lunch and look for a total lead of around 720-750. This way he can try to bowl England out for less than 200 on a badly cracking pitch (more on that shortly) and win the first test by the largest margin in test history. Thus, he stamps his mark quite clearly: He is no fool; he is a fantastic bat; a formidable captain and, perhaps most importantly, he and his team have the ability to destroy England.

The truth is England were shown to be wanting. Only the stand between Bell & Jones offered the kind of resistance required for such occasions. The last time we saw that away from home was Atherton in Jo'burg all those years ago. Freddie was caught dreaming again. KP didn't impress and Giles scored more by luck than judgement. What remains true is that McGrath exploited the pitch to his own ends. He bowled onto the cracks that exposed the right handers; he bowled short to those known to be lacking the right shots and he never faded. Compare that to the tired England attack who failed to even really trouble Langer; only removed Hayden through the finest of margins (good throw and collection though) and had no answers to RP's superb strokes.

I'm not an aussie fan by far but hell they have something. Langer is excellent. The shots he turns around the corner almost out of his body; His skillful cover drives and defence of the odd 'good' ball prove that form is indeed temporary but class is forever.

RP now has the chance for real revenge. He is certainly one of the greatest living batsmen. A lesser man would have resigned after 2005. RP didn't. He is running the risk of a gamble that England 'could' bat out a draw. (They could...but won't...all they want to do is walk away and lick their wounds. I suspect Flintoff will be doing a raindance...even so we don't stand a chance against such talent).

All that remains to be said is that our bowlers lacked the gumption to exploit the pitch. The toss was important in this match...but even if we had won it I doubt that we would have declared on 602. We would have been lucky to make 450!