Ricky Ponting has slammed the Pakistan bowlers after their disappointing outing during the second Test at Adelaide. Australia piled up 589 on the board before reducing the visitors to 103/6 at the end of day 2 of the day-night Test at the Adelaide Oval. David Warner reached his first triple hundred in Tests, and also forged a 361-run partnership alongside Marnus Labuschagne for the second wicket, which is now the highest partnership in a day-night Test match.
Talking about the Pakistan bowling attack, the former Australian captain said that he hadn't seen a 'worse bowling attack' Down Under for a long time.
"They've been poor. They're undermanned. Their bowling attack is really poor for a Test attack. I'm not sure if I've seen a worse bowling attack on our shores for a long time and I'm not being critical, that's just what they've got" Ponting told cricket.com.au.
"The guys thay they've decided to pick for this tour.. I still don't understand why the 16-year-old (Naseem Shah) hasn't played this game. I'm not hearing any injury reports or anything (on him). They've gone with another guy (Muhammad Musa) who has played seven first-class games and doesn't look like a Test match bowler. So, yeah, they haven't got much caddle.
"If you don't have much caddle against a batting lineup which is as hungry as ours, in our conditions and (against) a team which is really trying to prove themselves at the world stage, then Pakistan is really caught in a perfect storm."
Ponting, however, praised Shaheen Afridi, but insisted that the other bowlers need more experience at the international arena.
"Afridi is really good. Take out his fielding and he is outstanding and looks like a real prospect. But he's only 19. He has played a bit more cricket, he has played more one-day cricket. The other kids are just too inexperienced.
"Mohammad Abbas, we all understand how good a bowler he is, but he's bowling around 120 km/h.. he has lost 10 km/h in the past few years. If you're bowling with that sort of pace on these wickets, you got to have everything else right. With the field, with the discipline, with the line and length," said Ponting.
There has been a significant uproar over Tim Paine's decision to declare the Australian innings when David Warner was cruising towards Brian Lara's record for most runs in a single innings. Ponting admitted that the side could've given him a chance to go past the West Indies great's record, but stated that the conditions and bad weather were rightly taken into consideration.
"It must have been pre-meditated. It must have been talked about if there was a chance for that to happen. They were gonna let him go past Mark Taylor if he was good enough to do that and he certainly was.
"We were all sitting there saying that give him a chance to go past Lara as well, but the situation of the game and the series.. It speaks volume of the current team and Paine and Langer's leadership to put personal stuff aside and declare early than most probably expected.
"With the bad weather being around, they caught the bull by the horns and said we're going in now, we've got 590 on the board and we will knock a few overs tonight.
"I think today's decisions was spot on. He deserved to be out of path to break a few milestones because of how well he batted for a day-and-a-half. It doesn't happen everyday and we were privileged to sit back and watch a Test match triple hundred. I think the last one was three years ago," said Ponting.
