Live Score
Cricket Teams
Cricket Players
'India, Australia will play in the final and...': Ricky Ponting reveals his favourite to win 2022 T20 World Cup
Ricky Ponting has said that he expects India and his former team Australia to reach the final of the T20 World Cup later this year.
India may have had a rather disastrous outing in the 2021 T20 World Cup but they continue to be considered among the teams to beat going into the 2022 tournament, which will be played in Australia. Former Australia captain Ricky Ponting has said that India will be one of two teams to reach the final this year, the other being the hosts themselves.
Australia won their first-ever T20 World Cup title in 2021, beating New Zealand by eight wickets in a rather one-sided final. They got there by beating Pakistan, who were the only team to have won all of their matches in the Super 12 stage. Ponting said that he had not Aaron Finch's men to clinch the title in the UAE and so, they are the outright favourites now that they will be playing in home conditions.
ALSO READ | India a win away from creating historic ODI first in 39 years in West Indies
“I think India and Australia will be the two playing in the final and I will just have to say that Australia will beat them in the final. The reigning champions have got home conditions and that was one thing that made Australia’s win in the last World Cup, not remarkable, but that little bit sweeter for them,” Ponting said on ‘The ICC Review’ on the International Cricket Council's (ICC) website.
Ponting admitted that he was among those who thought that Australia won't be able to win in the UAE. "The fact that a lot of people, me included, thought when they went to UAE, the conditions that they were going to have to face on the back of the IPL, I thought the conditions might have been the thing that might not have allowed them to win it. But they found a way," he said.
Unlike Australia, India were dismal in the 2021 tournament, losing heavily to Pakistan and New Zealand in the Super 12 stage and thus getting eliminated despite winning the rest of their matches. Virat Kohli stepped down as captain, as he had decided before the tournament itself, and Ravi Shastri decided to not continue as head coach. Rohit Sharma has since taken over as captain of the team in all formats while former skipper Rahul Dravid has replaced Shastri as head coach.
