Ponting fumes at nasty English act during TV cross

Australian cricket royalty Ricky Ponting was left fuming after being hit by grapes while filming a television interview at The Oval.

Ponting – Australia’s all-time leading Test run-scorer with 13,378 – was working for Sky Sports during the fifth Ashes Test when the incident happened.

At the conclusion of day one in London, he was interviewing Aussie spin bowler Todd Murphy, who had taken two wickets to help roll England for 283.

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But while the broadcast rolled, Ponting was distracted from the interview and turned his attention to a section of the grandstand.

On closer inspection, grapes could be seen lying around his feet on the turf.

As the Murphy interview wrapped up, Sky Sports presenter Ian Ward pointed out to Ponting, “it looks like you’re being peppered with grapes”.

“I actually am, someone just hit me with a grape,” Ponting said.

“I wouldn’t mind finding out who it was, actually.”

The Aussie legend was visibly fuming and kept his attention on a section of the crowd.

“We’ll do that after we come off air,” Ward said.

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Ponting caused English fans plenty of grief during his career, amassing eight centuries at an average of 44.21 across 35 Ashes Tests.

He has also tormented the old enemy at times during this current series, despite being in the commentary box rather than on the pitch.

At Edgbaston earlier in the series, Ponting shut down old rival Kevin Pietersen in perfect fashion while the pair were analysing a session for Sky.

Pietersen was bizarrely lauding the innings of England batter Joe Root when Ponting put him in his place.

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“He owned the game,” Pietersen said of Root.

“He ran the game, he was pure quality and he just owned that space.

“All of this lot (pointing to Ponting) were just scratching their heads, going ‘what do we do?’.”

Ponting stared at Pietersen, looking bemused, before retorting, “well, he’s out now. He got 40”.

Ponting was also dragged into an awkward stoush following Ollie Robinson’s fiery send-off of Usman Khawaja in the first Test, when Robinson defended his actions by claiming, “We’ve all seen Ricky Ponting and other Aussies do the same to us”.

Ponting later retorted with, “If (Robinson) had used one of the current players as an example then fine, but I haven’t played for 11 years and probably haven’t sledged an Englishman for about 15. He must have a long memory”.

Aussie fans will relish seeing Punter going toe-to-toe with the English a decade after his retirement.

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