Former Australian captain Ricky Ponting has flayed England skipper Joe Root for not coming into the second Ashes Test with a plan other than to just bowl short and wait for Steve Smith and Co. to commit errors.<\/p>\r\n\r\n
Day 2 of the pink-ball Test saw the host batsmen frustrate England pace-bowling stalwarts James Anderson and Chris Broad, with Chris Woakes too receiving some rough treatment. Australia finally declared their innings at 473 for 9, and then reduced England to 17\/2.<\/p>\r\n\r\n
Ponting said on Saturday that, "Apart from the short-ball plan Stokes executed (on the first day), England didn't seem to have much of a plan after that. It was run in and bowl back-of-a-length and wait for the Aussies to make mistakes."<\/p>\r\n\r\n
"Well, when you're bowling to two of the top three batsmen in the world, they're not going to make mistakes. You've got to find a way to get them out and change things up." Ponting told cricket.com.au on Saturday.<\/p>\r\n\r\n
England tried to unsettle the Australian top order with either back-of-a-length or extremely short deliveries, which was counter-productive as opener David Warner (95), Marnus Labuschagne (103), stand-in skipper Steve Smith (93) and Alex Carey (51) played the balls on merit to take the hosts to a strong position.<\/p>\r\n\r\n
Ponting felt that England should have bowled full in a bid to swing the pink Kookaburra, adding that he wasn't sure whether skipper Root was instructing them to bowl short or the two bowling stalwarts - Anderson and Broad - were simply stubborn.<\/p>\r\n\r\n
"It can also be stubbornness from the bowlers and the unwillingness to change - that's what it looked like from Broad and Anderson with the new ball yesterday," said Ponting.<\/p>\r\n\r\n