The Hindu : Sport / Cricket : I will give back if provoked by ‘friend’ Ponting: Ishant Sharma

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I will give back if provoked by ‘friend’ Ponting: Ishant Sharma

— Photo: PTI

FRIENDS OR FOES: Ishant Sharma maintains that the newly forged camaraderie playing for Kolkata Knight Riders will not affect his rivalry with Australian Ricky Ponting.

New Delhi: They may have become friends after sharing the same dressing room for the Kolkata Knight Riders, but pace sensation Ishant Sharma on Wednesday said he would not shy away from showing his aggression against Australian captain Ricky Ponting when playing in national colours.

Ishant and Ponting had set up a great rivalry during India’s recent tour of Australia but playing for one team in the Indian Premier League Twenty20 competition has provided them with a chance to become friendly.

“It is a privilege to share dressing room with a great player like Ponting. We discussed cricket and joked at each other at the dressing room, we are just like friends now. But it is not that I won’t show aggression at him while playing for India against Australia,” Ishant said at a promotional programme here.

National colours

“No colour comes before you when you are donning your national colours. I will give back if I am provoked and the same thing had happened in the Australia series,” he added.

Ishant said the bad blood with the Australians in the recent India’s tour Down Under was a thing of the past and he would want to forget it and move on.

“The bad blood during the Australian series is past. We are professionals, we are friends off the field and don’t think of the past,” said the 19-year-old gangling Delhi bowler.

Asked what Ponting told him before he started bowling during Knight Riders’ match against Deccan Chargers in Kolkata, Ishant said, “he (Ponting) told me the first over was very important in any game. You had done well in the past and you should be doing that now.”

Ishant said he did not share the view of Ponting, Brett Lee and some others that the cash-rich Indian Premier League would mend the bad blood between the Indian and Australian cricketers.

“I don’t see that way. We are professionals and playing as a unit, so we have to interact, discuss cricket and other things. But, once you are face to face playing for your country it is different,” he said.

No favourites

Ishant refused to pick a favourite team in the IPL though he rated the Kolkata Knight Riders as very strong with a right mix of stars and youngsters in it.

“It is very early to predict who would win the IPL. Moreover in Twenty20 any team which plays better on that particular day wins,” he said.

Ishant also did not agree that the shortest format of the game was heavily loaded in favour of batsman. — PTI

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