Are Tendulkar and Ponting done? Is it time to call it a day?

[BoyBrumby]

I was just reading an article on cricinfo about Marlon Samuels as a test batsman (here, for the interested) & it links to the list of top runmakers for 2012.

Even after his recent travails Punter still averages 49.00 for the calendar year. More than Ali Cook, ftr.

Sachin's average for the current year a less impressive 24.18 tho.

[uvelocity]

who knows how and when the boots will be hung, but it's obvious they are both past it

[LongHopCassidy]

Put Ponting back at first drop. With Quiney there he's effectively batting 3 anyway.

[aussie tragic]

It's time for Ponting to go!

I remember when Doug Walters came back for Australia in 1980/81 after last playing for Australia in 1977 (he missed the first season after WSC)

Dougie played 6 Tests and scored 397 runs @ 56.71 but at age 36 was dropped for the 1981 tour of England, with his poor record in England being stated as the reason (18T, 745 runs @ 25.68, HS 88, 6 fifties).

Well Ponting at age 38 will next have to play in India, where he record there is comparable to Walters in England (14T, 662 runs @ 26.48, HS 123, 1 century, 5 fifties).

With his current form of 166 runs @ 18.44 in his last 5 Tests, Perth has to be make or break for him.

Here are some other players dropped with their record for their last 6 tests

Dean Jones, 527 runs @ 52.70
Michael Slater, 307 runs @ 27,90
Mark Waugh, 249 runs @ 27.66
Kim Hughes. 176 runs @ 14.66

So Ponting is in Kim Hughes territory now and considering Hughes got a pair in his last Test, they are very close (Hughes had 176 runs @ 17.60 in 5 Tests preceding his last).

I say make the call now as Khawaja, Hughes & Watson are ready replacements and all are far better than Trevor Chappell who replaced Walters when he was axed

[silentstriker]

The problem is you and a whole bunch of other ****s thought he was done in 2006 and if you had your way India would never have won a series in Englan and drawn series in SA since as you would have dropped him.

We are playing Yuvraj Singh. Why is sachin our biggest concern? Because he isn't as good as he was two years ago? So what? He's still better than Yuvraj ****ing Singh

He should have been dropped back then. He was a liability in the side. I care about winning. And if he wanted to come back, he should have played FC cricket, scored runs, and he'd be picked again. Ganguly left and came back. Unlike a lot of other people in cricket, I don't really hold people's age against them.

And just because Yuvraj also isn't Test class doesn't mean Sachin shouldn't be dropped.

[Red Hill]

If Ponting fails again at the WACA, then surely it's time to have one last hit at Bellerive against SL before retiring after the game. And it should be announced before the Bellerive test.

Just cannot carry top order batsmen who continually fail.

[Ruckus]

Ponting will play until he's dropped. He's fairly experienced in the pride-swallowing game as the first Australian captain to play on after being dumped in decades; anyone willing to wear that emasculation wouldn't be inclined to give a **** about retiring gracefully.

If allowed to play on his terms (and grecian's Quiney point nails it) he won't retire till the end of the next Australian summer. My theory is he has a haunting chip on his shoulder re: that little urn.

If that's true, that's garbage from him. He deserves to fail if his motivation to continue is a dream of getting back the Ashes for personal glory. He's got to understand it's not about him anymore, and it hasn't been for some time. He's no longer the captain, or the best batsman in the side. It's Clarke's team now and his role in the side has to be as a team man alone. But tbf to Ponting, I'm not sure if that is the main reason he wants to continue on. I genuinely think he would want to win as many matches for the team as possible and see it rise back to the top of the rankings.

On Ponting, does anyone know if there has been a worse form slump at the back-end of a career for an ATG batsman than him? It's been quite an astoundingly protracted slump - averaged 38.77 in 2009, 36.95 in 2010 and 31.92 in 2001, and 2012 (aside from the India series) looks like it's only heading downwards as well.

[Contra]

Dravid did it right, went out on a massive high really as his brilliant tour to England was fresh in everyones mind when he went.

Nah Dravid's final memory unfortunate will be this: Rahul Dravid bowled 6 (or 7) times in 8 innings - AUS vs INDIA 2011/2012 (Cricket) - YouTube

People aren't gonna remember his 3 centuries in England, only the fact that he was part of the team who lost 8-0 to England and Australia. That's not to say he didn't retire at the right time, but I don't think he went out on a massive high as you suggest, in fact, Dravid was a passenger in the Indian team for several years prior to that England tour.

[howardj]

Plenty of young indian domestic guns to get a game when Sachin goes, but i get the feeling that Dravid and Laxman felt the pressure a *little* of the Sachin retiring thing, someone had to go, they realised it was never going to be Sachin, so the knives would be out for them. Australia doesnt have the luxury of gun batting talent in the wings, our next best was apparently Quiney, no need to say any more. I guess we are waiting for Hughes to come again, Watson is no Ponting, if we really did drop Ponting my feeling is it would weaken us and no replacement is going to do much better, whether its Bailey or Ferguson or Quiney or whoever. I'd imagine Rahane for India or Badrinath would do a better job than Sachin is doing currently.

Ponting, in the last seven series, has averaged over 33 just once

Hard to see that anybody could do any worse

Moreover, it's oversimplifying things to ask whether anybody could do any better. It's about bringing in another young guy (Usman or Hughes) and letting them develop, improve and grow into the role. Ponting has no more development or improvement left in him. So yeah it's not all about could anybody else do any better. But just on that question, really they couldn't do much worse.

[howardj]

Having said that, I certainly don't think Ponting should retire

It's up to the selectors.

[DriveClub]

Yes.

India actually have a couple of youngsters who are waiting for their chances to replace Sachin but we don't have anyone, Quiney needs to go before Ponting.

[centurymaker]

wow 7 times bowled

yes Dravid had been in a slump for a long time, much longer than even Ricky Ponting.

I also feel that Ponting is only playing on to set his Ashes record right. (he's mentioned about really wanting to win in England a number of times). he's both mentally and technically shot against good quick bowlers.
Personally, I think he'll get one or two huge scores against Srilanka and stay in the team for another year.

Meanwhile, Tendulkar has absolutely no reason to continue playing at the age of almost 40. couple more failures and he'll feel compelled to announce his retirement.
His play against spinners has declined markedly over the last few years and on top of that he seems to have forgetten how to construct an innings. You find him playing strange shots too often, so he's mentally lost it too.

All in all, the sooner they retire the better for them and their respective teams.

[archie mac]

Ahh but they don't, in 15 years time they will be stat-botting, about how is average is poor compared to the new phenom, it's what us Viv fans have had to put up with for years.

Top post

The same goes for bowlers; I imagine Lillee's average went up towards the end not to mention two years to WSC.

I think more and more stars will have to be given the tap now that there is so much money in the game. Back in the 60s and 70s most Australian batsman would retire at 30 so they could concentrate on their employment careers. Now the longer you hold on the more money you can make. I think this more a consideration for Ponting than Sachin as the latter is loaded!

The tap has come to a number of Aussie batsman in the last few years. Some were just dropped others were given the chance to announce their retirement but still they were basically pushed.

Mark W
Steve W
Boon
Hayden
Langer

Just to name a few

[Briony]

Surely it's time that Punter went, it's not just this barren series but the manner of his dismissals. One could argue that there are not a number of ready replacements but surely it's better to have a youngster having a similar input but at least finding out whether he's up to it or not than an ageing warrior tarnishing his legacy.

They put up Punter's figures for his last couple of years and apart from the Indian series his averages are very poor, especially against teams which have decent bowlers. Remember the ton and double ton were on flat surfaces against an attack which was firing blanks. And even then he still didn't look like the Punter of old.

His calendar year might compare favourably to others but only because of the Indian series.

Nobody should have the right to make their own call on retirement when the saga drags on.

Invers said last year after the kiwi Hobart loss that had there been someone else around they would have made the call then.

If they play him indefinitely he will eventually make more runs, particularly against SL but does that solve the Ashes problems surrounding the top order?

[Viscount Tom]

If he does go Clarke has to move up the order he's improved a lot as a batsman over the past 2 years his record at #4 is iffy more because he lost form than lack of ability you cannot keep debuting people at #3 against good attacks and expect them to do well from the get go.

It might have worked when Shield cricket was of a really high standard but at the moment it's nowhere near as high as it was say 6-7 years ago.