Australian captain accepted defeat graciously and said that India were the rightful winners of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy.

"It was a fair result. India dominated the series and we were chasing our tails all through," said Ponting after India wrapped off the Border-Gavaskar Trophy with a 172 run win in Nagpur in the fourth and final Test.

Ponting rued the fact that his bowlers could not get break vital partnerships in the Indian lower order: "We failed to do that in Bangalore and we failed to break the MS Dhoni and Harbhajan Singh partnership in Nagpur."

The Aussie skippper came in for severe criticism for using part time bowlers on the penultimate day of the Nagpur Test, allowing India to get out of jail but he reasoned it out: "It doesn't help when you are nine overs behind in the over rate when you are trying to win a Test macth."

"India capitalised on that and got back into the match."

The Australian skipper said his team tried to take a first innings lead in Nagpur but were thrown off the track thanks to India's tactics.

"We were not able to get a first innings lead. We were obviously slowed down by India's tactics on the third day."

"Partnerships have been crucial but we were not able to build up on too may like the Indians."

Ponting said his team still believed they could win the match, with 369 runs needed off 90 overs: "If we played perfect cricket, there was a good chance we could have won the Test. We were just not good enough."

Ponting hailed the Indian for some high standard cricket and said the onus would be on his team to keep the high standards up in the India-Australia rivalry/

"It is now on us to keep the standards up the next time we play India, be it here or in Australia. Now, we need to focus on the series against New Zealand and need to be competitive there."

He was also full of praises for debutant spinner Jason Krejza, who was nominnated the Man of the Match for his 12 wicket haul.

"He is a good talent to have and will learn a lot with time. I am sure he would have picked up a lot of things in this tour."