Rickey Ponting calls Delhi pitch 'Worst Pitch Ever' after losing to SRH

Delhi Capitals coach Ponting fumes after their five-wicket loss on Thursday as Feroz Shah Kotla pitch suits Hyderabad more than the home team

Livid with the pitch, the struggling Delhi Capitals coach Ricky Ponting said the Feroz Shah Kotla ground staff provided the "worst" pitch possible for the home team in the IPL encounter against Sunrisers Hyderabad here.

Sunrisers comfortably beat Delhi Capitals by five wickets on Thursday night on a track where run-scoring was difficult and suited the visiting team's bowlers even more. The former Australian captain made it a point to mention that inputs provided by the groundsmen were completely opposite to how the pitch played out.

Ricky Ponting

"I think it is fair to say that the wicket surprised us a lot. Talking to the groundsmen before the match, we thought this would be the best pitch that we had by far but it was the worst. You saw how little it bounced and how slow it was," Ponting told reporters after the match.

Sunrisers' Afghan spin duo of Mohammed Nabi and Rashid Khan took three wickets among them, giving away only 39 runs in their combined eight overs. "Look, at the end of the day, it is the same pitch for both teams but if you would have asked me, would I have wanted to play Sunrisers on that type of pitch? I mean, there couldn't have been a different wicket where you would have wanted to play Sunrisers on," Ponting smiled as he answered but his anger was palpable.

He then explained that how the slowness of the nature took his team's pacers like Ishant Sharma and Kagiso Rabada out of equation and in turn helped their seamers Sandeep Sharma and Bhuvneshwar Kumar. "It [pitch] absolutely suited their game. They have great spinners and all their seamers just bowled slower balls. And on that wicket, when you bowl slower balls it is near impossible to hit," he reasoned.

The coach then said that if the nature of the Kotla track remains the same during the remaining four home games, he will have to seriously think about his team combination. "But if the wicket is going to remain like this, then we have to think about our selection in our team as well," he said.

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