Cricket story by Georgina Scane, Fri, 06 Jan 2006 16:04:00 GMT


SYDNEY - Ricky Ponting blazed away to a record second century in his 100th test match as Australia wrapped up the series 2-0 at the Sydney Cricket Ground today. Graeme Smith's brave declaration backfired as Australia won with more than 15 overs to spare.

Earlier South Africa began the day needing to score runs at a fast clip if they were to nurse ambitions to square the series. Jacques Kallis notched up a half century and Shaun Pollock blazed away to 26 off just 20 balls as skipper Smith set Australia a challenging target of 287 for outright victory.

The chase began in earnest and was intense right through as Langer and Boucher exchanged hot words that were picked up by the stump microphone. Langeveldt picked up Langer's wicket and at 30-1 it looked like a match was on. But Ponting and Hayden combined well together and as the sun shone brightly at the SCG guided the hosts to a comfortable victory. Hayden was out for 90, but by then the game was all but over.

Ponting refused to bask in self-praise and credited his team for a brilliant performance. "Let's not worry about the records. It's just been a really good team win. I'm really happy with the way the team is going at the moment."

Ponting was criticized for his dour captaincy during the Ashes loss in summer, but has come up trumps when it matters, "I said to the guys today we just had to hang in there and take early wickets and make them declare with something that (we could chase)," he said. "Anything around 300 I thought we could get given enough time, and that's how it turned out."

South Africa captain Graeme Smith refused to admit that he had erred by declaring early, "Everyone in the whole team wanted to be positive this morning and go for a win," he said. "I think we've dominated a large portion of this Test match. We've had our noses in front the whole game and because of the weather we had to take a very big risk on a pitch that was probably playing like a third-day wicket."

The teams will play a Twenty20 match at Brisbane before the Tri-Series involving Sri Lanka as the third team.

Match Summary
South Africa won the toss and elected to bat
South Africa: 45-9 declared (Jacques Kallis 111, Prince 119, Lee 3-82)
Australia: 356 all out (Ponting 120, Gilchrist 86, Nel 4-81)
South Africa: 194-6 declared (Kallis 50*, Gibbs 67, MacGill 3-33)
Australia: 288-2 (Ponting 143*, Hayden90)
Result: Australia won by 8 wickets, win series by 2-0
Man of the Match: Ricky Ponting
Man of the Series: Ricky Ponting

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