Captain's Corner: Rating the last 5 Australian skippers

#3 Ricky Ponting – 7/10

Ponting irritated opposition batsmen with his close-in fielding and chirping

Ricky Ponting's era as Australian skipper saw the team stay at the top of world Cricket as the most dominant side for a long time. He had some brilliant players and made the best use of them as the years between 2004 and 2011 is termed as the 'golden era' of Australian cricket.

Ponting was a specialist close-in fielder and known to enjoy a word or two with the batsmen. In spite of being the skipper, his war of words with opposing players continued. He was termed aggressive, brash and uncouth but it worked for Australia and him in a period where the side was almost unbeatable.

Stats: Ponting stood as Australian skipper in 77 Tests, winning 48 and losing just 16. His W/L ratio of 3 after so many games at the helm suggests a winning culture. In ODIs too, Ponting was a great captain, with 164 wins in 229 games. He never got a hang of T20s though and lost 10 of the 17 games he skippered.

High point: Back to back World Cup wins in 2003 and 2007. The first triumph was architectured by a fine inning in the final by the skipper himself. Meanwhile, in 2007, he led a group of old warhorses and emerged victorious in the unfamiliar conditions of the Caribbean Islands.

Under Ponting, Australia won two World Cups

Low point: The 'Monkey-gate' incident at Sydney Cricket ground, where he and Symonds were alleged of racial comments against Harbhajan Singh turned out to be a bleak point of his captaincy. He was severely criticised for his arrogant nature after the match.

Verdict: Ponting is undoubtedly one of the best skippers Australia have had. He had an aura of confidence about him and much of that, it must be said, stemmed from a group of highly skilled players.

His captaincy cannot be undermined, though and was vital to Australia's success during the period. However, it was the golden players under him that contributed the most. But when all said and done, two World Cup wins and a comeback win in the Ashes is no mean achievement.