Ricky Ponting was not only interested in amassing hundreds as a player; the two-time World Cup-winning former Australia captain has revealed that he meticulously collected every bat with which he scored an international hundred, complete with the exact score and the name of the opposition written on it by him. The 49-year-old Ponting, presently the head coach of DC, was one of the most feared big-hitters of his day and was speaking at the DP World Beyond Boundaries programme, which distributes kits to young players in Delhi. Ponting scored 71 international hundreds, 41 in Tests, throughout his illustrious playing career, which ended in 2012.
“Believe it or not, I have still got my first bat at my home. It still has all the stickers and everything on it. We literally have had probably a thousand of bats by now, some are more special than others. I kept every bat I scored an international hundred with and I write on it, the score and who it was against,” Ponting revealed. One of his most notable knocks was a World Cup-winning unbeaten 140 against India in the 2003 final. He annihilated the Indian bowling attack, led by Zaheer Khan, almost single-handedly winning the trophy for Australia.
Does that bat feature in his collection too? “Yes it does,” came Ponting’s reply, even as the then India captain Sourav Ganguly, who is currently the Capitals Director and was sharing the dias with the Australian here, looked on with a smile on his face. But this memorabilia is hidden away at his home and is not meant to be showed to anyone. “It’s not like it’s displayed in my house. I keep those in my garage,” he added. Ganguly also spoke at the event, recalling the day he received his first bat. “I remember I had my first bat when I was 13 and how happy I was because the ball would just fly off the bat,” the former BCCI President said.
Source Agencies
