Sydney: Former Australian skipper Ricky Ponting underlined the big headache for the the side. He feels that Australian team lacks a finisher like MS Dhoni, Kieron Pollard, Hardik Pandya in their side. Players who have plenty of experience in finishing games, and can take responsibility to do the role of a finisher in this year’s T20 World Cup.
Needless to say the Australia cricket squad have a bunch of talented players ready for the upcoming T20 World Cup against India. The Aussies will eye their first-ever world tittle in the 20 over format. Captain Aaron Finch will have the likes of Smith, Warner and Glenn Maxwell. All-rounders Marcus Stoinis, Moises Henriques, D’Arcy Short, and wicket-keeper-batters Matthew Wade, Carey and Josh Philippe.
“The spot they’ve always been worried about is that finishing role, and one of the reasons for that is that all of our best batsmen bat in the top four in the Big Bash, so you’ve actually got no one that’s consistently batting in that area. It’s a very specialist position to be able to go in with three of four overs to go, with 50 runs needed and be able to do it,” Ponting was quoted as saying to cricket.com.au.
The legendary skipper further opined about all the finisher’s role in the shortest format. Citing the example of Dhoni, Pollard and Pandya for nailing the job for their IPL teams and national team respectively. “Dhoni has been in that finisher spot in his whole career and no wonder he’s so good at it. Hardik Pandya and Kieron Pollard these two guys continually win games for their country, they’re also similar like Dhoni. That’s exactly what we’ve got to find for Australia. That’s the area the side are most worried about. It is only going to be (Glenn) Maxwell and Mitchell Marsh that are going to finish the games, is it going to be Marcus Stoinis?” he added.
“They’ve still got some questions to answer as far as what their overall squad looks like and I think the biggest one is who is going to be standing behind the stumps with the gloves on. Because of the finishing spot they would be losing the most sleep according to me.
They have tried a few times Wade has been there, Phillipe has just played as a batter, Alex Carey has been in and out and tried in a few different batting spots. Josh Inglis’ name could be thrown into the ring as well. I really liked what I saw from him batting in the middle order in last summer’s BBL. He plays spin really well and you think about where the World Cup is going to be , he could be a name that could come up (for selection),” he concluded.
