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| April 28, 2007 | Saturday | Rabi-us-Sani 10, 1428 |
Ponting kept waiting by Jayawardene
BRIDGETOWN, April 27: Tensions between Australia and Sri Lanka have heightened after a fuming Ricky Ponting was kept waiting by rival skipper Mahela Jayawardene on Friday.
Sri Lankan captain turned up an hour late for a scheduled beach photo shoot with Ponting and the Cup to promote Saturday's final. Ponting made appointment despite having to travel with his team from St Lucia to Barbados and had to twiddle his thumbs before Jayawardene arrived after attending a golf function.
“Bit late are you?” snapped Ponting. Jayawardene replied: “I didn't know about this, seriously.”
He blamed a communication breakdown and peak-hour traffic jam. Whatever reason, there's no doubt it will further motivate world champions Australia, with relations somewhat testy between two camps.
“Given amount of travel that had taken place, for Australian captain to be left waiting for an hour with 100 media lining up on beach and sun going down was very unfortunate,” said an Australian team source.
Australia had already taken a dim view of Sri Lanka resting their top three bowlers for ‘dead rubber’ Super Eights clash between two teams.
Sri Lanka's coach Tom Moody hit back, saying his team's selection was not Australia's business and it was no different to Australia resting key players for recent Chappell-Hadlee series in New Zealand.—Agencies
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