The New Nation - Internet Edition

AFP, Sydney

Australian media turned on the nation's world champion cricketers over a bitter dispute with India Tuesday, branding their behaviour "boorish" and "arrogant", with one newspaper demanding captain Ricky Ponting be axed.

Sydney's Daily Telegraph said the crisis that had engulfed the game since Australia's ill-tempered second Test victory over India here on Sunday was the worst since the infamous Bodyline series against England in 1932-33.

The row erupted after Indian spinner Harbhajan Singh received a three-match suspension for allegedly calling Australia's only black player Andrew Symonds a "monkey" and the Indians accused the host nation of not playing in the spirit of the game.

"The arrogant Ponting must be sacked," ran the front page headline in the Sydney Morning Herald, while the banner heading The Australian newspaper's feature page screamed "Ugly Australians".

With India delaying the next stage of its tour Down Under over spinner Singh's suspension for racism, the media turned the spotlight on the Australian behaviour that has left the tourists seething.

"It has become apparent in recent years that the attitude and behaviour of Australian players worsens the moment their superiority is seriously challenged," The Australian's Mike Coward wrote.

He said the Australian cricketers regarded themselves as hard-nosed and aggressive but failed to understand that many in their own country and beyond found their antics "boorish, arrogant and ungracious".

The Sydney Morning Herald's Peter Roebuck singled out Ponting as the main culprit, saying he should be sacked because he was so intent on victory that he allowed his team to behave in a way that embarrassed Australia.

"He turned a group of professional cricketers into a pack of wild dogs," Roebuck wrote, citing the failure by some players to walk when clearly out, the sledging aimed at the Indians and Australia's strutting victory celebrations.