Shane Warne attacks Ricky Ponting over Michael Clarke comments in autobiography

Shane Warne has attacked Ricky Ponting over passages in Ponting’s autobiography

Ex-Australian captain Ricky Ponting recently released his autobiography At The Close of Play, in which he criticised Michael Clarke, who was the vice-captain of the Australian cricket team at the time.

Although it did cause an uproar, Ponting and Clarke have since sent text messages to each other to resolve any differences.

But Shane Warne has come out and attacked Ponting over the content in the book and said that it would not go down quietly, even going on to imply that Ponting was ‘jealous’ of Clarke’s performances in Ponting’s final years of his career when Clarke was a much better performer than him.

“To bring up the stuff about Pup (Michael Clarke) – maybe there was a bit of jealousy, because Pup was batting so well and Ricky was not making any runs,” Warne said.

“To me, Michael’s very well respected. The best captains keep stuff in the dressing room. No-one ever finds out about it. That’s what good leaders are about. So to hear all this in a book is pretty ordinary.’”

Warne was very honest with his opinions and even brought up Ponting’s Ashes record as captain.

“I know he beats himself up mercilessly about being the only Australian captain ever to lose three Ashes,” said Warne.

“And I know Ricky made that horrific decision to put England in at Edgbaston in 2005. I don’t want to be mean about Ricky – he’s a good guy and he tried to do the best he could.”

Ex-England captain Michael Vaughan also had something to say on Twitter to Warne after his comments on Clarke.

Take your blinkers off @warne888 .. How can M.Clarke be the best Captain in the World when his team doesn't win Cricket matches??? #fact.

— Michael Vaughan (@MichaelVaughan) November 4, 2013