By IANS,
Sydney : Hurt with Australia’s Ashes loss, legendary spinner Shane Warne asked if the transition period in Australian team was really over.
“It hurts a bloody lot losing the Ashes. I really felt for Ricky Ponting and the Australian team after seeing Andrew Strauss lift the little urn at the Oval,” Warne wrote in his coulumn in the Daily Telegraph.
“The vultures are circling and looking for answers, but to me it’s pointless and destructive to sling criticism about why we lost the Ashes. It is more constructive for those in charge to work out how to move forward. Many members of this team were playing in their first Ashes series, but there comes a time when the transition period is over. How long is that period?” he said.
Warne said that with the loss, he realised the pain of losing the Ashes in 2005 in England the first and the only time in his career.
“It took me back to Michael Vaughan doing the same in 2005, and how it felt to lose the Ashes for the first time in my career. I understand how all the Australian players must have felt. Ricky was fantastic the way he conducted himself during and after the Test, and it was nice to see the English crowd appreciate him,” Warne said.
Warne said that the Australian team has been together for 12 months and has played excellent cricket; at other times ordinary cricket.
“People must realise this team will be inconsistent, which is frustrating. There is no disgrace in losing if you are outplayed by a better team, as was the case in 2005. This time around, though, I don’t think England was much better. That’s why it hurt even more and why questions have to be asked. Australia could not win the big moments,” he said.