Australia is the best Test team in world: Yousuf

Pakistan skipper Mohammad Yousuf has described Australia as the best Test team in the world after the latter clean swept the Test series 3-0.

"Yes, the best team, because they're a good side with all good players. If you see the statistics, they have good batting averages, good bowling averages, the wicketkeeper average nearly 40 (runs), they have a good side," The Sydney Morning Herald quoted Yousuf, as saying. 

Talking about Pakistan's fielding, which had a big role in the team's downfall, Yousuf said: "A lot of catches were dropped, that's why we lost the series, otherwise maybe a different result."

Pakistan dropped 14 catches, the same number grassed in New Zealand. Yousuf, however, stressed that the team did its best.

Australian skipper Ricky Ponting said the Pakistan team had some quality players, but they disappointed their captain when it mattered. 

"Everyone thought Pakistan were going to beat us, but it's a matter of them being able to do it for long enough spells and that''s what you have to learn in this game," Ponting said.

"Pakistan pushed us and had their moments in Sydney, but they couldn't do it for long enough to get themselves a win and that's what they have got to keep striving to do," he added.

Ponting backs North

Australian skipper Ricky Ponting insists that struggling left-handed batsman Marcus North is not the weak link of the team.

Ponting's comment comes amidst calls from former cricketers and selectors, who have said that Cricket Australia must sack North and experiment with young players in preparations for the Ashes series, which is just 10 months away.

"He's not a weak link at all. It was only a couple of Tests ago that we were saying that he's probably our best and most in form player," The Herald Sun quoted Ponting, as saying.

"I don't see a weak link in our side and hopefully everything turns out the way we want it for Marcus and he can go to New Zealand, have a good series and then there won't be any speculation about anyone in our lineup," he added.

The 30-year-old has just 41 runs from three Tests against Pakistan at 10.25 and 207 runs this summer at 23 -- figures that could end his Test career when the selectors meet next month to name Australia's touring squad to New Zealand.

North's Test average has also dropped from 56.56 to 36.70 in five months and while he has three Test tons, he has also posted nine single-figure scores in 21 Test innings.