Former Australia captain Ricky Ponting has returned to work where he was commentating on the Australia-West Indies Test match in Perth soon after 24 hours of him suffering “sharp pains” in his chest that saw him going to the hospital. Ponting opened up on Saturday morning on Channel Seven about the health scare he had faced on Friday. He was thankful for the quick thinking of his close friend and former team-mate Justin Langer and Seven’s head of cricket Chris Jones as they asked him to go for immediate treatment after feeling pain in his chest during a commentary stint before lunch on Friday as well.

“I probably scared a lot of people yesterday and had a scary moment for myself,” Ricky Ponting told Channel Seven. “I was sitting in the comms box halfway through the stint and got a couple of really short and sharp pains to my chest. I tried to stretch it out and get rid of it, and probably didn’t want to give too much away when I was on air.”

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He continued, “I had a couple of those incidents, got through the stint and went to walk to the back of the commentary box and got lightheaded and dizzy and grabbed the bench. I mentioned to JL on the way out, who was commentating with me, that I had had these pains in my chest and Chris Jones heard me and just reacted straight away and got me out of there. Ten or 15 minutes later, I was in the hospital getting the best treatment that I possibly could. I feel great this morning, I am all shiny and new this morning.”

I had my little mate JL looking after me and I'm back here shiny and new this morning. Ready for a good day of Test cricket after missing the best part of yesterday. https://t.co/w98EUZCS8E

— Ricky Ponting AO (@RickyPonting) December 3, 2022

However, nowadays everyone become well aware of their heart health as the cricketing world has seen the sudden deaths of former Australia players Dean Jones, Rod Marsh and Shane Warne and the serious heart attacks of former team-mates Darren Lehmann and Ryan Campbell as well.

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“I think the bottom line is, the fact that I was willing to share it with JL and the fact that your mate looks after you, I think as people of our age, we are a little reluctant to share much or talk about our health and I think that is a good learning curve for me yesterday, especially with what has happened in the last 12-18 months to really close people around us. My little mate looked after me and got me down there and I’m back, shiny and new this morning,” Ricky Ponting concluded.