Ricky Ponting and Shane Watson spoke to the media after Australia made a dramatic comeback in a game that at one stage seemed to overwhelmingly go West Indies’ way

Dileep Premachandran at Kuala Lumpur12-Sep-2006

Ponting: ‘As I said to all theplayers last night, it’s going to be difficult for us just to get thetempo again’ © Getty Images
Ricky PontingOn the turnaround
We were really struggling. I thought we did a pretty good job with thebat, to tell the truth. It wasn’t the easiest conditions to bat in. Wedidn’t think it was till Shiv [Chanderpaul] came out and played the way he did.[laughs]. That was probably the best way to play on that wicket, to justback yourself and try and make use of the Powerplays. As I said at thetoss, I always thought it was going to be hard batting second. In thesesort of humid conditions, I thought it would seam around a bit more atnight time. Once we got those couple of wickets, we got on a bit of aroll. I don’t know what it was in the end – something like a 9 for 20-odd. Itwas a pretty amazing comeback.On McGrath’s return
He was a little bit frustrated early on. He was actually swinging it,which is very unlike him, so I told him halfway through his first spellnot to worry about swing and get back into hitting a good area. I thoughthe was excellent in the second spell. It was a pretty important time tocome back on and take a wicket and keep things pretty tight. He’ll onlyget better with bowling. We all know that. That’s the reason he’s here, toget some bowling under his belt.It’s his first game in 12 months, and he’d have been disappointed withbowling as many wides as he did in his first spell. As I said to all theplayers last night, it’s going to be difficult for us just to get thetempo again. I think Glenn was just trying a bit too hard in his firstspell. It’s a matter of getting his body in the right shape to do what hewants to do.On whether they might have experimented too much with team composition
We’ve managed to win by 78 runs so I didn’t think we experiemented toomuch. Coming here with 18 guys, we were always going to mix and match, andwe’ve done the best job we can. As I said yesterday, some guys will gettwo games, some will get three and only one player in the whole squad willget all four games. That’s the ‘keeper [Brad] Haddin. That’s just the way we’redoing it.On Mitchell Johnson taking two key wickets in his second spell
At that stage of the game, I got Glenn and Mitchell back because I thoughtthey’d be our best wicket-taking chances. Mitch copped a bit of stickearly but to be able to come back and get those vital wickets was great.It won’t do his confidence any harm at all. It was a pretty amazing gameactually. We haven’t had the chance to sit back and think about it.On Johnson getting Lara for the second time in two games
That sort of wicket tonight, it was very suited to seam-up bowling. Oncewe got a bit of a sniff, I told our bowlers to attack the stumps. We’llhave to make sure we play Mitch in the next game against the West Indiesif he’s got that sort of record against Brian [Lara].On what went through his mind as Chanderpaul and Gayle cut loose
It can be really hard to stop that sort of batting at times, no matter whoyou bowl or what fields you set, when you’re on a roll, as Shiv was, andwith Gayle joining in. But once you get two wickets, you expose newbatsmen to those conditions,On what he thought of the pitch
It wasn’t a great batting wicket. We made 280 batting first but there wasenough variation there to make it difficult.On Watson and Johnson
Man of the Match and 4 for 40, I think Shane deserves to answer somequestions. It’s terrific to see blokes that work so hard on their game getsome reward. Shane’s been around for a while now, and played someexcellent cricket for us of late. Mitch is in the same boat, and justkeeps improving game by game. We need to keep exposing these younger guysto the international game. Until you’ve done it a few times at the highestlevel, you’ll always have a few doubts in the back of your mind.Shane WatsonOn bowling in those conditions
Our batters did an extremely good job to get us to 280 and set us up. Ireally enjoyed bowling out there. One-day wickets are usually extremelyflat, and geared towards the batters. When there’s a little bit ofmovement there, it’s always handy to bowl.On his tactics when the ball was being flayed everywhere
My thinking was to try and change it up a little bit. I was trying to bowla few yorkers, a few bouncers and a few slower balls to stop the batsmengetting into a rhythm against me.On missing a hat-trick
I’ll take four wickets any day of the week. It would’ve been nice, but I’mextremely happy to contribute to a really good fightback.