Step Aside, Mr.Ponting!

After the retirement of Shane Warne, Glen McGrath, Mathew Hayden, Justin Langer, Adam Gilchrist and Damien Martyn, Australia's decline in Test cricket was expected but now that it's right in front of us, it surprises. 

Ponting was made captain in 2004 and till December 2007 had lost only three Tests as captain. In January 2008, India beat Australia in the Perth Test. To prove that it wasn't a fluke, India beat Australia in another two Tests in October of that year to take their home series. Mixed results meant Australia's aura of invincibility had by then tarnished.

A home series loss against South Africa gave a sense of what was coming. But Ponting reinforced his claim on captaincy by winning the away series against the South Africans. The loss of the Ashes though, for the second time in England, when Ponting had recovered them in style through a 5-0 drubbing of England the last time the two teams had met (2006-2007), meant there were calls for taking the captaincy from him. Ponting responded with seven Tests wins on the trot, albeit against weaker Test sides (Pakistan, New Zealand and West Indies).

The date: 24th July 2010, the venue: England, the opposition: probably the weakest Test side Pakistan ever had, and Australia were beaten by Pakistan in a Test match for the first time in nearly fifteen years, after 13 consecutive wins against Pakistan. Ponting was disappointed but not as disappointed as he was when two months later his team lost against India again, this time by just one wicket. 

Second and last match of the series, Ponting would have been dreaming of victory after his side had scored a formidable 478 in the first innings and got Sehwag out cheaply. But Sachin Tendulkar, with his new habit of scoring runs even when India wins, churned out a double hundred and a fifty to seal the match for the Indians, and Ponting was left with another record, that of being the first Australian captain in 22 years to lose three consecutive Tests and the first to lose all matches of a series since 1982.

Ponting had always had the support of former captains, but now that Geoff Lawson has called for his axing and Shane Warne, regarded as the best captain Australia never had, tweeting furiously about his tactics for Nathan Hauritz in the last Test, it looks as if this Ashes series will be the last for Ponting as test skipper. Australia is still number one in ODI rankings, but it wouldn't save Ponting post the World Cup next year.

In his tenure, Ponting has lost five Test series in six years which by Australian standards is a lot. Australia has slipped from 1st to 5th in the ICC Test rankings, and it will be the first time since the rankings were introduced that England would be ranked higher than Australia at the start of the Ashes. To be fair to Ponting, some of the matches he has lost as a skipper were very close matches, a 1 wicket loss to India, a 3 wicket loss to Pakistan, and a 2 run loss to England. But the fact remains: he has yet to win a Test in India or a series in England. And it looks like he won't be getting another chance.