 | « Back to article | Print this article |
Australian batting great Ricky Ponting on Tuesday hailed the Indian Premier League as the world's best domestic T20 competition "by a long way", saying it is one of the best places to learn for talented youngsters such as Jake Fraser-McGurk.
Ponting, Delhi Capitals' head coach, was in awe of Fraser-McGurk who sizzled with an 18-ball 65 against Sunrisers Hyderabad, even as his team lost the match by 67 runs.
"There is no doubt about it that he (Fraser-McGurk) is a highly talented young man but he is by no means a finished product yet. There is a lot of things to improve in his game and there are not many best places to learn than IPL because it is the best domestic T20 competition in the world by a long way," Ponting said.
"The other day he made 65 off 18 balls but it is important he learns from that. He needs to make a 100 like (Yashasvi) Jaiswal did last night.
"Top-order batsmen, when they get opportunity to make big scores, they should go and get it, that's the difference between winning and losing games," the World Cup-winning Australian skipper added.
Ponting said execution in all departments matters a lot and they can't falter at the start, like they did in their last match against Sunrisers Hyderabad.
Opting to field, the DC bowlers were taken to the cleaners by Travis Head and Abhishek Sharma, the SRH openers putting on a record power play score of 125 for no loss. SRH eventually finished at 266/7 to win the match by a huge margin.
"The important thing is to look back and understand what things worked for us and what didn't work.
"We didn't probably play as well under pressure as we would have liked. We knew the way Travis and Abhishek will come out and play, we planned for it but we got a little bit confused what we were trying to do," Ponting said on the eve of DC's match against Gujarat Titans.
"Leaving the power play we did a really good job in the whole game, the last 14 overs to restrict them to 266 was actually a pretty good effort. And our batting in the last couple of overs we were on track.
"So there are positives to take from that game but we can't start a game of cricket like that, we can't be that far off from execution because in this competition, against good players, these things will count," he added.
Coming back to Fraser-McGurk, Ponting expressed his desire to work with the 22-year-old and help him polish his skills.
"He is learning and I would like to work with him more for the next couple of years. He is just a terrific kid. He has simple game plan, hit the first ball for 6, second ball for 6, and we are letting him go and play as he wants to," he said.
Ponting also talked highly of young wicketkeeper-batter Abishek Porel, who played a few cameos for DC while coming in as an impact player.
"We have seen Porel on a couple of occasions going in at No. 3. I think he is a future star. He has got real talent.
"He is still leaning every day, he is learning about his training, he is learning about different phases of the game," the coach said.