"Was A Bigger Rival When...": Ponting On His Equation With Ganguly At DC

Australia dominated world cricket for more than a decade. During the same period, the team won three back-to-back ODI World Cup titles. In 1999, Steve Waugh led Australia to their second World Cup title, before passing the baton to Ricky Ponting, who outshined him with back-to-back World Cup triumphs in 2003 and 2007. During Australia's period of dominance, only Sourav Ganguly's India came closest to possessing a threat to them. Both Ponting and Ganguly had plenty of face offs, including the one during the Sydney Test in 2008, when the former claimed a controversial catch.

Despite their not so fruitful exchanges in the past, Ponting and Ganguly seemed to have buried the hatchet.

While Ponting is the head coach of Delhi Capitals (DC), Sourav Ganguly is the Director of the IPL franchise.

Speaking on the DC podcast, Ponting shed light on his equation with Ganguly while working for the franchise. The 48-year-old said that Ganguly was more of a rival when Waugh was the captain of Australia

"When you talk about rivalry, he was a bigger rival when Steve Waugh was the captain. They had a bit more edge than Sourav and I. We did play a lot against each other, we captained in the World Cup final against each other. But he was involved with DC back in 2019 when things really started to change. He went to the biggest seat in the last couple of years, and now he's back with usWe get on really well because we can see the bigger picture for this franchise, and what we have to do together to guarantee success for DC," Ponting said.

Ponting recalled the time when he captain Harbhajan Singh, who he described as one of his greatest rivals on the field, at Mumbai Indians.

"Regardless of if we're not good mates, when you're working in a team , you got to come together and focus on one direction. Leave the past behind, whatever's happened has happened. One of the best examples was when I went to Mumbai... one of my biggest on-field rivals was Harbhajan. Next minute, I'm walking in MI and captaining him! I'm catching off his bowling and hugging him! That's the really good thing about the IPL. The international rivalries are probably not as strong now because you're working with those guys," he added.

DC are enduring a poor outing in IPL 2023, having lost seven of their 11 games in the season so far. They are currently reeling at the bottom of the points table.

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