"I think the Australian selectors handled it very well. Whenever therewas a group of players of the same age on the verge of retirement, they broughton youngsters regularly," the twice World Cup winning skipper said.
"I think it would leave a big hole if the likes of Sachin Tendulkar,Rahul Dravid and Anil Kumble leave the game at the same time."
Ponting sought to demystify the aura about Australian coaches, saying thecritical acclaim they enjoyed should be put down to the stupendous success ofthe champion team itself.
"If the national side hadn't been playing as well as it had been doingover the past few years, I don't think Australian coaches would have been muchsought after," he said at a promotional function in the Capital.
Advertisement
Ponting, who led Australia to their fourth World Cup triumph in the Caribbeanearlier this year, believed "a coach is as good as the team" he workedwith.
He did not think the coach needed to be a magician either.
Citing the example of former coach John Buchanan, Ponting said "Hehelped me as a player and as a captain. And he did all that without ever havingplayed Test cricket. A coach doesn't need to be a superstar."
Ponting, 32, said Buchanan stood for what a good coach should be.
"What a team needs is a man manager. Someone who manages time well,thinks outside the sphere of cricket and challenges the players everyday. That'swhat Buchanan was very good at."
Advertisement
Ponting was guarded when asked to rate Rahul Dravid as captain.
"When you rate an opposite captain, you must remember that most work incaptaincy is done off the field. It depends on how well the captain knows hisplayers, how much time he spends with them and such things," he said.
So how do the two of them manage to keep their batting form even when saddledwith leadership responsibilities?
"When I walk out to bat, I don't think like a captain. I tell myself Iam the number three batsman. It is important for me to separate captaincy andbatsmanship."
The topic of sledging seemed to touch a raw nerve in him.
"I don't like the term sledging," Ponting said. "Cricket isnot the only sport where players talk ... I would probably use the wordgamesmanship."
Moving on, Pontings feared the art of spin bowling may disappear within thenext 10 years because of the surfeit of limited overs cricket.
"To me spin bowling is an art. I have had the good fortune to play withone of the finest ever spin bowlers, Shane Warne, but I fear that this art formmay disappear in 5-10 years because of the number of one day internationalsbeing played right round the year," Ponting said.
"More and more the teams use less and less spin bowlers in their team inODIs, with just one spinner present in most teams," he added.
Advertisement
Ponting's observation came in reply to a query about the great spin bowlersthat India had produced in the past like Bishan Singh Bedi, BhagwatChandrasekhar, Erapalli Prasanna and Srinivas Venkataraghavan and howchallenging it would have been to face them.
The 32-year-old Tasmanian, who piloted Australia to back-to-back World Cuptitles in 2003 and early this year to emulate West Indies legend Clive Lloyd(1975 and 1979), felt that of late he had mastered Harbhajan Singh.
"I lost my wicket to him five times in that series in India whilescoring a mere 17 runs. It was as if I was batting blind-folded. But over theyears I have got the better of him," he said of the Indian off-spinner.
Advertisement
The Punjab bowler, nicknamed 'Turbanator' following his record haul of 32wickets in the memorable 2001 series won by Sourav Ganguly's India, made Pontinghis bunny by dismissing him in all the five innings he batted.
PTI
