IT'S not often you'd call a $US400,000 ($436,000) pay day a loss, but Ricky Ponting could be forgiven for wondering why he didn't get more. As captain of an extraordinarily successful cricket team and with a sparkling career batting average, Ponting was expected to fetch a fair sum during the bidding.
Instead, Kolkata got him for that relatively paltry figure. Ponting fared worse than West Indian Chris Gayle ($872,000) and Kiwi Brendon McCullum ($763,000). Even Pakistan's Mohammad Asif ($709,000) and Shoaib Akhtar ($464,000), whose drugs bans were controversially overturned, attracted more.
Ponting's potential earnings may have suffered because of the Sydney Test against India. Of all the Test captains up for grabs yesterday, he was the least sought-after.
Jamie Pandaram
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