Ricky Ponting Named Head Coach Of Punjab Kings: In an unexpected turn of events, former Australian captain and now coach Ricky Ponting has joined IPL side Punjab Kings as their head coach.
Ponting, who is one of the most successful captains in cricket history, has been associated with several IPL franchises throughout the years. In the twilight of his playing career back when the league started in 2008, he played for the Kolkata Knight Riders before dropping from the league, returning in 2013 with the Mumbai Indians, getting replaced as the team captain by Rohit Sharma, and winning the league before retirement.
Since then, Ricky has taken several coaching jobs. First, he was the head coach of Mumbai in the IPL from 2014 to 2017. From 2018 onwards, he has been the head coach of the Delhi Capitals. He has led the franchise to its golden era as it reached the playoffs for three consecutive years from 2019 to 2021, even reaching the 2020 final.
Ricky Ponting Named Head Coach Of Punjab Kings
But now, it seems, the Aussie’s long-running tenure with the Capitals has come to an end. ESPNCricinfo has broken the news that ‘Punter’ has signed a multi-year contract with the Punjab Kings to become the team’s head coach.
Not only that, but the 49-year-old will also be responsible for choosing and hiring the support coaching staff, which he will do in the next few days. It remains to be seen whether any of the previous coaching staff remain. Trevor Bayliss was the team’s head coach, Sanjay Bangar was the Head of Cricket Development and batting coach, Brad Haddin was the assistant coach, Sunil Joshi was the spin-bowling coach, and Charl Landeveldt was the pace-bowling coach.
Ricky Ponting has a massive task ahead of him as the PBKS head coach. This franchise has not reached the playoffs in a decade. For the past 10 seasons, they have not finished in the top four despite acquiring several superstars of world and Indian cricket over this time.
Ponting’s immediate challenge would be to find a replacement for captain Shikhar Dhawan, who spent the last two seasons mostly injured and has now retired from cricket. There is also a mega-auction before the next season, which will also provide a challenge for the coaching staff to build the right squad.
Currently, Sam Curran is the biggest name in the squad and the biggest earner, earning a whopping 18.5 Cr for the past two seasons. The question now is, will he, or someone like superstar bowler Kagiso Rabada, be one of the retained talents? The team can also go a different route and retain uncapped players who performed well in 2024, the likes of Shashank Singh and Ashutosh Sharma.
Ricky Ponting is also the head coach of the Washington Freedom in the USA’s Major League Cricket.
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