New Delhi: Speaking for the first time over the ball-tampering scandal, former Australian captain Ricky Ponting on Thursday revealed that he was absolutely gutted after hearing about how things panned out on the tour of South Africa.
The two-time World Cup winning captain admitted that the revelation was a shocker for him and the wrath of Australian public that the trio faced was justified.
“As a past player and captain, I was quite shocked to see what actually took place out on the field. When I was back in Australia a week and a half ago, if you think it was big news out over here, it was astronomical how big an issue it was in Australia and rightly so. We as Australians like to play the game hard and fair and our fans expect Australian players to play that way. Reaction of Australian public felt that Australian players had not played the game in a fair way," Ponting said during his media interaction organised by his IPL side Delhi Daredevils.
The term of ban has been in question since the time verdict came out from Cricket Australia. Speaking on the length of the sentence, Ponting similar to other legends showed disappointment.
"It would appear that 12-month ban is very severe but look at what ICC sanction was. It was 1 game ban on Steve Smith and no sanctions for the other two. Now we have nine months for Bancroft and 1 year for other two. So there is a vast gap between sanction that CA imposed and what ICC deemed fair. " Ponting opined.
Ponting in his interaction also refuted the perceptions that ball tampering and sledging are deep-rooted in his country's cricketing culture and asserted that cultural stuff was being blown out of proportion.
"Cultural issue is a really interesting thing for me. If we wind the clock a couple of months back, when Australia won the Ashes like they did, there was no talk about cultural problems or issues whatsoever. But I think a lot of times, cultural things can be blown out of proportion, when the reality inside the dressing room is completely different than what it is spoken about all the time. Honestly feel, on this occasion, I think cultural stuff spoken about is being blown out of proportion to a certain degree," the legendary batsman said.