Ricky Ponting names his favorite to win the Asia Cup 2022 title

International cricket is coming thick and fast and the next biggest event that the fans are looking forward to comes from Asia. UAE is set to witness some of the biggest names in Asian cricket as they are set to host the Asia Cup 2022 edition. The tournament was initially supposed to be played at Sri Lanka. The political and domestic turmoil though has meant that the tournament was shifted to UAE. The first game of the tournament which is to be played in Dubai will witness Sri Lanka take on Afghanistan.

Ricky Ponting labels India favorites for the title –

Asia Cup was last played in 2018 at UAE and India had won the title under Rohit Sharma by beating Bangladesh in the final. The tournament 4 years earlier was played under the 50 over format, this year it will be played in the 20 over format similar to the 2016 tournament. Interestingly India had won both the previous two editions, 2018 under Rohit and 2016 under MSD. According to former Australia skipper Ricky Ponting, the men in blue could be in for a 3 peat. Ponting said “ It's always hard to go past India in any tournament, not just an Asia Cup, but I think every time we talk about the T20 World Cup which is coming up, I think that India will be right in the thick of it there. Their depth is definitely better than the other teams and I think India will win the Asia Cup”

Ponting names his favourite for the India -Pakistan clash –

India and Pakistan cricket fans have waited for nearly 10 months to see the two go head to head. The men in green had beaten India by ten wickets during the T20 world cup game last year. The Indian fans are looking for revenge and the game is to be played on 28th August, speaking about the game Ponting said “I'll stick with India to win that clash against Pakistan. That's taking nothing away from Pakistan because they are an incredible cricket nation that continues to present out-and-out superstar players”

Ponting speaks on the rivalry India and Pakistan share –

During his playing days, Ricky Ponting enjoyed a heated rivalry with traditional rivals in England as well as with India at the turn of the millennium., The former 3 time world cup winner spoke on the Indo-Pak rivalry and said “When I think about rivalries, Australia and England and Ashes cricket is the pinnacle I’ve always thought of for our Test match game. I'm sure India and Pakistanis will say the same about that and the actual rivalry would be the pinnacle of Test match cricket for those two countries as well. To be totally honest it's one that we've been starved of, haven't we … looking back the last 15 or 20 years. As a cricket lover like I am and a cricket observer, any time those sorts of battles come up it's almost always nice to sit back and watch because everything just goes up a notch, doesn't it”

(All the quotes are from Ponting’s interview with Sanjana Ganesan from ICC Direct)