NO SOONER had Australia punted Ricky Ponting from its one-day team than the knives came out for the other great batsman of his generation, Sachin Tendulkar. It is a measure of India's misery in Australia this summer that even the revered Tendulkar is under attack. The country's first World Cup-winning captain, the great fast bowling all-rounder Kapil Dev, said he had outstayed his welcome in the one-day team.

Tendulkar's quest for a 100th international hundred moved him to stay for the one-day series despite not having played that format since the World Cup final last April, and in this series is not justifying his place in India's best XI.

There have been signs of deterioration in his batting and captain M. S. Dhoni has alluded to the 38-year-old's slowness in the field, unable to pick senior batsmen Tendulkar, Virender Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir in the same team. ''It's important to know that every cricketer has his time,'' Dev told The Times of India.

''Having served India for 22-23 years, there surely is no greater cricketer than [Tendulkar]. But he should have announced his decision to retire from the shorter format soon after the World Cup … Age is not on his side as it was earlier … Probably he is a cricketer who loves the game more than us. There are some people who cannot leave cricket.'' Dev's comments were backed by another former captain, Sourav Ganguly.

''Sachin has to ask himself whether he is good enough to play one-day cricket day in and day out; whether it's helping him missing tournaments and playing a one-day series after eight-nine months, whether it's helping him as a one-day player or if it's helping the Indian one-day team,'' Ganguly told Indian TV channel Headlines Today. ''If Sachin can't get an answer to these questions, he has to go.'' India has won just one match that Tendulkar has played in this summer, and he has managed 90 runs at 18 in the ODIs so far.