An angry Punter

At one point in England’s desparate rear-guard yesterday evening, the 12th man appeared with a message for Anderson and Panesar.  The next over, he appeared again with some replacement gloves for one of the batsman.  Then, the physio appeared on the pitch.

This made Ricky Ponting angry.  “Would you mind awfully leaving the field, there’s good fellows?” he was heard to ask them.  After the match, he all but accused England of time-wasting:

I don’t think it was required, he changed [the gloves] the over before and I don’t think they’d be too sweaty in one over.  I’m not sure what the physio was doing out there. I didn’t see anyone call for the physio to come out. As far as I’m concerned, it was pretty ordinary, really. But they can play whatever way they want to play. We came to play by the rules and the spirit of the game. It’s up to them to do what they want to do.

Andrew Strauss denies the accusation, saying that there was “a lot of confusion”.  Suddenly, it was 2005 all over again, with the 12th man and physio playing the role of Gary Pratt.

But before we hold Ricky Ponting up as a modern-day moralist and all-round good sport, Cricket With Balls reveals the Aussie captain’s other side.