The Delhi Capitals of the Indian Premier League will no longer have Ricky Ponting, the renowned Australian cricketer and captain of the World Cup, in their ranks. Prior to the huge auction for the 2025 edition of the rich league, it was reported that his seven-year time with the squad was coming to an end.
The owners parted ties with the cricket veteran because Ponting’s leadership did not provide the expected results for the team, according to ESPNCricinfo.”
“After 7 seasons, Delhi Capitals has decided to part ways with Ricky Ponting,” was the tweet sent out from the team’s official X feed on Saturday to confirm that Ponting was leaving. Coach, it’s been an amazing ride! I am very grateful for what you have done.”
Delhi has made three postseason appearances since Ponting was hired as head coach in 2018. Prior to that, the team was known as the Delhi Daredevils. These appearances came in 2019 and 2020 and 2021. In fact, Delhi advanced to the championship game for the first time ever in the 2020 campaign, although they were defeated by the Mumbai Indians.
But Delhi hasn’t made it to the last four stages in the previous three years. Based on net run rate, the team finished sixth this season and missed the playoffs by the narrowest of margins. This year, they have seven wins and seven losses.
But this season, the team had a lot of positives: not only did captain Rishabh Pant make a successful comeback to competitive cricket following a near-fatal accident, but a number of young players, including Jake Fraser McGurk, Tristan Stubbs, Abhishek Porel, and Rasikh Salam Dar, showed promise as future stars of the DC franchise.
We are having a terrible time finding the right words to express how we feel about you leaving as our head coach,” DC wrote in a social media statement.
“Care, commitment, attitude, and effort—the four elements you emphasized in every huddle—comprise our seven summers spent together. You had to be both hands-on and hands-off for seven summers in order for us to improve. Certainly as athletes, but above all, as people. You’d be the first to arrive at every training session and the last to leave for seven summers. You spent seven summers gnawing your fingernails till they fell out and running out of the dugout during tactical timeouts.”
Oh, the speeches—seven summers of your dressing room speeches! Seven summers of your hugs, shoulder pats, and fist pumps for us all—newbies, superstars, and everyone in between—are coming. (Separate post for that loading). Coach, thank you very much for everything! The message ended with, “You know how you usually end things like, ‘Let’s leave this here, pal, get back to work tomorrow, yeah?
Director of cricket Sourav Ganguly, assistant coach Pravin Amre, bowling coach James Hopes, and fielding coach Biju George make up the remaining DC coaching team.