Ricky Ponting is one of the all-time great batsmen in the annals of cricket. Even his harshest critic will admit that. He was a great player of pace bowling and his Test average of 41.97 in the Indian sub-continent & UAE proves his dominance in spinning conditions too. He scored 13378 runs in 168 Tests at a batting average of 51.85 with 41 centuries and 62 fifties.
However, over the years there have been many great batsmen who have been found wanting against a particular bowler. Michael Atherton was Glenn McGrath’s bunny and Grame Smith was often dismissed by Zaheer Khan.

Ricky Ponting pulverised many bowlers but his nemesis was Harbhajan Singh.The ‘Turbanator’, Harbhajan Singh seemed to get the better of him on most occasions in Tests, particularly in India. He was dismissed by Harbhajan, 10 times in Tests, out of which 3 were ducks. He averages only 22.3 against Harbhajan which is way below his overall Test batting average. He acknowledged that he had his problems against Harbhajan and admitted that he failed to master the off-spinning maestro.

 “My arch nemesis when I was playing against India was Harbhajan Singh. I still get nightmares about him.”

This candid admission by Ponting speaks volumes about how high he rates the wily Indian. He was the 300th Test victim of Harbhajan. In the 2001 Australia’s tour of India, which was Harbhajan’s coming of age, Ponting scored just 17 runs in 5 Test innings and was dismissed by Harbhajan on all 5 occasions.

Ponting then gave his opinion on the modern day batsman and said that Virat Kohli has the potential to be an all-time great if he maintains his consistent performances over the coming years.

“Virat Kohli is an ultra-skilled and talented player, I think Steve Smith and Kane Williamson are also in the same boat.”

Ponting also said that not much should be read into Australia’s recent Test mauling at the hands of Sri Lanka as they have always been in the top 3 in the Test rankings and have performed very consistently in ODIs over the years. Australia have won 4 out of the last 5 ODI World Cups.
“If you look at one series in isolation, then it looks exceptionally bad but at the end of the day, Australia have been in number one, two, and three ranked Test teams for the last 10 years and are the World Cup holders in the one-day cricket. Australia have bounced back after a disappointing series against Sri Lanka to win the ODI series convincingly.”

Ponting said that there was no reason to be pessimistic about Australia’s performances as they have many talented players and had the ability to bounce back.

“It is not all doom and gloom. We have some very talented players for Australia: David Warner, Steve Smith, Nathan Lyon, Usman Khawaja, Mitchell Starc. We are going to play India in a Test series over here very soon. So it will be once again a great challenge for Australian players coming to subcontinent.”

Australia tour India for a 4 Test series beginning next February and it will be a challenge for their Test team to perform well on tracks that are likely to take spin.

Quotes taken from – https://circleofcricket.co/