Ponting blames 'favourite shot' for injury

Ponting, who had a a screw inserted in his right wrist to repair tendon damage, blamed his signature pull shot against the West Indies during the one-day series in Grenada last July. In his Captain's Diary 2008, Ponting reveals the injury ''was more severe than anyone realised'' at the time. ''I was on 26 when it happened,'' he wrote. ''I played a pull shot off Dwayne Bravo, and as I was running up the pitch for a single I thought, 'That feels weird. Something is up'.'' ''Daren Powell botched up his pick-up on the boundary and the ball went for four, and as I walked back past Watto (Shane Watson), I said flatly, 'I've done something to my wrist','' he added. ''I hit seven fours in my innings, but six of them came in the first half of my knock, and at the end I was struggling to even pick my bat up. ''I've watched the replay of that pull shot off Bravo 100 times, and I can't see anything unusual in my body actions that could have caused such a major injury, so maybe it's just one of those things that happen over time, like a rubber band you keep stretching until it finally snaps.'' The 33-year-old learnt about the seriousness of the injury only after returning to Melbourne for surgery. ''The doctors explained that I'd torn ligaments and damaged the sheath that keeps the main tendon in my wrist in place,'' Ponting said. ''The doc says it's an injury he's seen a few times with tennis players, and when you think about the way we use the bottom hand when playing a pull shot, that's not too dissimilar to hitting a forehand,'' he added. ''That might explain why it happened.'' However, Australian team physiotherapist Alex Kountouris has dismissed sugestions that Ponting's career will be cut short by the chronic injury and feels he will be available for the upcoming home series against the Proteas.

-- (UNI) -- 04SPD8.xml

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