London, July 13 (IANS) England’s batting hero Jimmy Anderson said Australian captain Ricky Ponting got it wrong by bowling part-time spinner Marcus North in the dramatic final overs of the drawn Cardiff Test, but the Australian captain defended his decision saying he used the off-spinner to squeeze in as many overs as possible.
As England held out for a nail-biting draw, Ponting bowled North for two of the final four overs at a time when Australia’s pacemen had been far more threatening to the last batting pair of Anderson and Monty Panesar. Offspinner Nathan Hauritz was bowling at the other end.

“Certainly when they put Marcus North on I thought we had a great chance, them putting a part time spinner on,” Anderson was quoted as saying by the Australian media.

“I thought, we’ve got a good chance here because Monty was playing it very well, we were communicating well together.”

Ponting vigorously justified using his spinners as he realised time was running out and he insisted Australia needed to bowl as many deliveries as possible at England’s last pair.

“Look, we were running a bit short of time,” Ponting said. “Once they forged that last partnership we needed to get as many balls into their batsmen as possible. A few other minutes were taken up by other things. Two left-handers being in, two offspinners being on, I thought we could create some chances.”

England skipper Andrew Strauss would not criticise Ponting’s tactics, but felt the tailenders would have found paceman Mitchell Johnson more difficult to face.

“I could understand what he was doing but personally I thought Mitchell Johnson would have been harder for these two to face,” Strauss said.

“Each captain sees things differently, I suppose. It’s a difficult situation when you’re trying to rush through overs when you get to the back end of the game there.

“I remember against the Aussies at Old Trafford in 2005, you always have regrets at the end of a game like that because you think if you’d done this differently you might have taken a wicket.

“The reality was that it was a very flat wicket and it was difficult to prise people out, especially if they showed application, which the second half of our order did,” said Strauss.