Ponting admits captaincy is in the balance

Australia's captain, Ricky Ponting (R), talks to coach Tim Nielsen during a practice session at the WACA ground in Perth on Wednesday, ahead of the third Test against England starting on Thursday.

PERTH - Australian captain Ricky Ponting admitted on Wednesday his future is uncertain as he tries to avoid an unwanted piece of Ashes leadership history.

With a buoyant England up 1-0 heading into the third Test at the WACA ground, starting here on Thursday, Ponting is in line to become the first Australian skipper in 120 years to lose three Ashes series.

Ponting's wavering form with the bat - he is without a century in his past eight Tests and has managed just 461 runs at 35.46 in that time - is doing little to ease the pressure on the Tasmanian 35-year-old.

The No 3 said he needed to do more if Australia was to turn around its poor start to the series, conceding that an Ashes defeat could end his reign as captain.

"Probably not a decision for me to make, is it?" he said. "I don't pick myself as captain so... the decision's completely out of my hands.

"At the end of the day, I'll do my best to make sure we're on the winning end this week and I'll do my best as a player to make sure I score runs and lead the team the best way possible.

"Then the powers-that-be will make those decisions I guess at the end of the series, or after this Test match."

Ponting has been unable to impose himself in the series so far, with 70 runs at 23.33, and was hopeful the break between Tests could work to his benefit.

"I had four or five days off completely after Adelaide and just got home and tried not to think too much about cricket for a couple of days," he said.

"I got here and felt nice and refreshed and trained hard and trained pretty well the last few days so I'm looking forward to the challenge here, as I do for every game.

"I know a lot of our success revolves around how well our batting does at the top of the order and my input in the series so far hasn't been what it's needed to be for us to win games.

"So, purely and simply, I need to stand up. I need to score runs and we need to play better cricket than we have in the last two Test matches."

(Agence France-Presse)