'Its too time consuming' - Ricky Ponting rules out taking up full-time coaching in near future

Former Australia captain Ricky Ponting has ruled out any possibility of taking up full-time coaching especially with the national team. His name has been doing the rounds for quite some time with Justin Langer‘s time at the helm running out soon. Ponting, however, is happy coaching the Delhi Capitals (DC) in the Indian Premier League (IPL) only for a couple of months for a year.

Apart from his IPL stint, the 46-year-old has worked as the commentator and analyst as well before. Interestingly, he was the part of the Australian support staff in the World Cup 2019 as the batting consultant. But clearly, Ponting is currently happy doing only side on roles with the full-time coaching needing more commitments and time.

“It’s too time consuming, where I’m at in my life. That’s why I’ve chosen a bit of the IPL because it’s in our off-season at home and generally, at best, an eight or nine-week commitment. And it doesn’t get in the way of the Australian summer which is the other thing I love, my work with (Channel) Seven whether it be Big Bash or Test matches. I’ve found a nice little niche.

“If I can do stints with the Aussie team or another team during the Australian winter, then that’s fine and that’s how it worked out with that last World Cup that Justin asked me to be a part of,” Ponting said while speaking in Perth radio station SEN’s ‘Gilly and Goss’ program.

Ricky Ponting feels Australia are short on power-hitters

Meanwhile, opening up about Australia‘s T20 World Cup squad to compete in the UAE, Ricky Ponting opined that the team is lacking power-hitters in their line-ups. All the good batsmen are the top-order batsmen and play at the same position in their Big Bash League team as well.

“All the batters in our T20 team bat one, two or three for their Big Bash teams and inevitably they become the leading runs scorers at the end of every Big Bash so they get picked for Australia. But who bats at five or six for their Big Bash team every game who’s in the current Australian team? There’s no-one,” Ponting further added.