New Delhi: As Ricky Ponting and Graeme Smith posed for the cameras with their International Cricket Council Championship mace and One-Day International Championship shield respectively, the talk was not about their accomplishments, but the Indian Premier League (IPL).
The South African skipper, a member of the victorious Rajasthan Royals team in 2008, is clearly over the moon about the tournament coming to his home country.
"It's a fantastic thing for South Africa. Not only South African cricket, I think it's going to provide us with new opportunities and a massive opportunity to showcase another event just before 2010 (when the football World Cup will take place). I know no stone will be unturned to make it a success and I know having come home from the last IPL how people had enjoyed the IPL here in South Africa," said Smith.
But Ponting isn't changing his mind about giving this year's event a miss.
"With what we've had already in the last couple of months and what we've got coming up, the only opportunity I had was to try and step aside from the IPL for an extra couple of weeks and give me a chance to get my body and my mind right for what we've got in the next six to eight months. So really, it was a pretty easy decision for me to make," said Ponting.
Reports from New Zealand suggest that India's players aren't too happy about the move to South Africa but that sentiment isn't shared by cricketers in India.
Starting Friday, South Africa will be trying to reverse the result of the Test series against Australia in the two Twenty20 games and the five-match One-Day series, but that now seems like a mere appetiser for the main course.
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