'Kumble's comment a little disappointing'

Agencies

Posted online: Tuesday, January 08, 2008 at 0000 hrs IST

Sydney, January 8:
The Australian team has rallied behind skipper Ricky Ponting who is facing attacks from the local media and whose removal has been demanded.

“Ricky has got the full support of everyone in our team and probably every cricketer around Australia,” leading batsman Michael Hussey told reporters even as a well-known cricket columnist Peter Roebuck demanded that he should be sacked as captain.

“I think he is the best captain I have played under.

We go out to play the game as hard as we can but also as fairly as we can, and Ricky is very big on that,” he said.

Hussey also said the Australian team had nothing to apologise for, maintaining the now-threatened series had been played in a hard but fair spirit.

The batsman, whose second Test century in Sydney has been almost forgotten amid the controversy, said he was 'shocked' by Indian captain Anil Kumble’s assertion that only one team was playing in the spirit of cricket.

“That was a surprising comment and a little disappointing,” Hussey said on Monday at the Sydney Cricket Ground, where he was filming a cricket-based Bollywood movie.

“The spirit has been fantastic for the first two Tests, and not just that, for the 60 years we have been playing Test cricket against India. The two teams actually get on very well; it has been absolutely brilliant.

“That’s why I’ve been shocked (by Kumble’s remarks).

There have been a lot of contentious decisions, but you’ve got to accept the umpire’s decision. It takes discipline to do that without showing any dissent,” he said.