I don’t like seeing it at all: Ricky Ponting on Adelaide crowd booing Virat Kohli

Virat Kohli was booed by a section of crowd gathered at the Adelaide Oval when he came out to bat after the dismissal of KL Rahul on Saturday. It was surprising considering the warm applause he drew when he came on to bat in India’s first innings on the opening day of the first Test against Australia.

Australia batting great Ricky Ponting has condemned the practice of the negative practice but opined that it wouldn’t have affected the India captain at all.

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Ponting can relate to it since he has experienced the behaviour first-hand when he was booed by the English crowd during the Ashes 2009.

“I don’t like seeing it at all,” Ponting told Cricket.com.au. “It didn’t worry me as a player when it happened in England a couple times. You’ve almost got to accept it as acknowledgment for what you’ve done in the game. But I’d rather not see that happen at all.”

He continued, “It’ll be water off a duck’s back (for Kohli), I’m sure. He’s probably had worse things happen to him on a cricket field, I would have thought, than getting booed by a couple of spectators as he walks on. If anything, it might have steeled him a little bit more.”

Kohli, who lasted 16 deliveries in India’s first dig, dropped anchor on a rain-affected Day 3, consuming 104 deliveries to frustrated Aussie attack. He was batting on 34 late in the evening when Nathan Lyon had him out at short leg to provide some reprieve to his team. “He (was) hardly playing a shot (early in his innings) and he looked like he wanted to really ground the Aussies into the deck,” Ponting said of Kohli’s steely resolve.

India finished the day at 151/3 to extend their lead to 166.