WITH the Australian Test team training in the background, Ricky Ponting is a familiar figure at Bellerive.
But instead of being dressed in Test attire, Ponting is in the purple and black of the Hobart Hurricanes as international cricket moves on without Australia's all-time leading Test and one-day run-scorer.
Ponting, arguably Tasmania's greatest sportsman, says it was only this backdrop that made him realise his international career was officially over.
But while reality has set in, regrets haven't.
"I actually felt yesterday and today it was the days that hit me the most," says Ponting, 38 next week.
"I'm here training with the Hurricanes and the [Test] boys are out the back in the nets ... you sit back and watch the Australian cricket team train at Bellerive and I'm not a part of it. [But] I'm comfortable with it, the decision was made for all the right reasons."
It is a new era for Australian cricket as the Test team enters the post-Ponting epoch on his home ground at Blundstone Arena.
Labelled the country's best batsman since Don Bradman, the former teenage prodigy from the working-class Launceston suburb of Mowbray was grouped for a generation alongside Indian cricketing deity Sachin Tendulkar, West Indian stylist Brian Lara and South African run-machine Jacques Kallis as the world's best batsman.
While cold hard statistics made them hard to separate, a reflective, relaxed Ponting says the "big four" enjoyed varying personal relationships.
A batting purist, he rates Tendulkar as the best technician, but the flamboyant West Indian as the most destructive and the one more often able to win games off his own blade.
"I've never really got that close to Sachin, that's sort of the subcontinental way," he says.
"They don't really socialise much after games. They are out of the changerooms half an hour after the game is over, which is a bit different to what we do down here, especially if we have a win.
"Lara and I always got on well.
"From the first time I toured there in '95 we struck up a bit of a relationship then, even though I wasn't playing, and that's remained right throughout the years.
"We've always exchanged bats at the end of series with hand-written messages on them.
"I would say out of the three guys, Lara is the one I'm closest to."
ePonting's career is decorated with more jewels than a royal crown - World Cup victories, an Ashes whitewash, Allan Border Medals, most Test wins by a captain, to list a few - but there were also dark days.
He knows three Ashes defeats will forever be linked to his captaincy, particularly the 2005 series when an Australian team containing such greats as himself, Shane Warne, Adam Gilchrist, Glenn McGrath and Matthew Hayden lost the little urn for the first time since 1989 through a combination of complacency and some misfortune.
"Nothing worked at all. One little mistake generally meant we lost the game even an umpiring decision here or there, if it had gone our way, could have been the difference," Ponting says.
"As a captain, that's as disappointed as I've felt. At the end of the day my record shows I lost three Ashes series as captain, but that is the one I was most disappointed about."
Perhaps the biggest turning point in his career was also its lowest ebb. In 1999, he copped a black eye from a Bourbon and Beefsteak bouncer in Kings Cross - and a harsh lesson that no matter how talented, without dedication and professionalism, nothing was guaranteed.
"I was suspended for three games as a result of that," he says.
"When you have the only thing you've ever wanted to do in your life taken away from you, of course it is a wake-up call.
"Back then I was just doing what everyone expected that you did.
"I certainly wasn't out by myself that night, there were other blokes out with me.
"That's a lesson learnt. You wake up the next day and think 'how did I let that happen and how am I going to make myself better tomorrow?'
"That's a pretty simple thing I've lived my life by since the early days at international level."
He adds with a laugh: "I haven't been back there; I don't think I've ever been in Kings Cross again either, so I've stayed as far away as possible."
Married to Rianna with daughters Emmy (4) and Matisse (1), Ponting says he can now concentrate on being a better husband and father - duties he has struggled with because of the demands of international cricket.
"Knowing I've got such a great life away from cricket made that decision a little bit easier as well."
Another season with the Tigers and the Hurricanes is a possibility, depending on his hunger now the lure of Australian representation has gone, saying he would move home tomorrow from his Sydney base if Rianna would agree.
He will continue to work with his charity, the Ponting Foundation, maybe dabble in the media - "I've already told the boys to look out for that. I think I would enjoy telling people the way I saw the game" - and is awaiting a call from his beloved North Melbourne to talk about a possible board position.
He will endure more than enjoy a lap of honour today. Public adulation is not his cup of tea, but he is keen one last time to thank his local fans who supported him throughout his international career.
"Although I've lived out of the state now for just over 10 years, Tasmania is always my home and I've always said that," Ponting says.
"At the end of the day that's where I learnt the game and I still feel I owe a lot back to the Mowbray Cricket Club and Tasmanian cricket for the opportunities I was given at a young age.
"Do I feel like an ambassador? Yes, I do, and it is important for all people in the spotlight, like I've been, to take on those roles and want to be promoting your state or your club or your junior cricket or whatever in your area. I've always wanted to be a role model for people to look up to in Tasmania."
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