Ricky Ponting is reminded of his struggles when he watches a current batter play in the subcontinent

With two of Australia’s premier batsmen serving bans, the field is wide open for others to fill in the gap. One such player who is expected to rise to the occasion is Pakistan-born Usman Khawaja but he has not been as effective in overseas conditions. But former Australian captain Ricky Ponting is not yet ready to discard him and feels the 31-year-old needs some support to overcome obstacles that he faces while batting on surfaces in Asia.

Australia will next tour the United Arab Emirates for two Tests and three T20Is against Pakistan starting next month and all eyes will be on Khawaja. The left-hand batsman has managed just 117 runs in nine Test innings in the sub-continent at an average of 14.62.

This is in stark contrast to his nearly-60 average in Tests in Australia. Khawaja, however, had a decent tour of India with Australia ‘A’ recently scoring a couple of hundreds – one each in a List A and first-class game. His 127 and 40 scored against India ‘A’ in Bengaluru in a four-day game helped the visitors crush the hosts by 98 runs.

Khawaja has to find his feet, feels Punter

Ponting, one of the best batsmen and captains Australia produced in the history, said that he too had big difficulty negotiating bowlers in Asia earlier. He advised Khawaja to find his feet in the UAE as a remedy to his batting woes.

“There’s been lots of different discussions over the last couple of years about Khawaja and how to get the get the best out of him,” Ponting told cricket.com.au.

“(People wonder), ‘is he an Australian Test match player only? Do we just not pick him on the subcontinent?’”
Punter, who averaged almost 42 in 28 Tests he played in Asia as against his overall average of 51.85, said Khawaja is Australia’s best batsman “by a street” in the absence of the likes of Warner and others. He said the more Khawaja play in those conditions, the better he will be equipped to work it out.

“It’s difficult. I was a bit the same; the first few tours I had to India, I struggled. But the more I played, the more I learned about how I was going to survive and how I was going to cope. The last couple of tours I had there were some of the best I ever had,” the 43-year-old said.

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