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MELBOURNE - Australian cricket captain Ricky Ponting has thrown his full support behind Andrew Symonds in the wake of Harbhajan Singh's reduced penalty and tipped his teammate to respond on the field.
Symonds came in for criticism in the judgment passed down by New Zealand's Justice John Hansen, who downgraded the racial abuse charge against the Indian spin bowler to a charge of abusive language.
Harbhajan, who allegedly called Symonds a "monkey" during the second Test in Sydney, was initially suspended for three tests, but that was this week downgraded to a fine.
Justice Hansen, who heard the appeal, criticised Symonds in his role in the incident for having words with Harbhajan after the Indian patted the backside of Brett Lee and congratulated him for bowling a good delivery.
Ponting said several Australian players were disappointed with Justice Hansen's verdict, and that the saga had taken a huge toll on both he and Symonds.
He was not impressed with Justice Hansen's apportioning the blame on to Symonds.
"Any sort of character assassination on Andrew Symonds would be completely unfair," Ponting said.
"He's someone who doesn't want this stuff happening, it's the second time with what he had to go through in India (last year) as well.
"It's the second time he's been through this sort of stuff and the last thing in the world he wants.
"What I do know is he's a terrific bloke, an honest bloke and he's a great teammate of mine, so I'll stick up for him at any opportunity."
Ponting predicted Symonds would respond in the best possible way in tomorrow night's Twenty20 match against India at the MCG.
"Right the way through this he has had a fairly amazing knack of when things have gone against him or gone bad that he's been able to play some of his best cricket as a result," he said.
"In India when some of this stuff happened he was the man who really stood up and won us a few a few games over there, and I've got no doubt that he'll be able to do exactly the same thing as this summer wears on.
"There's no doubt it has taken a toll on him and it's taken a toll on me over the last few weeks because we're dealing with stuff in the middle of games that we don't want to be talking about or thinking about."
- AAP
