Strauss not worried about Ponting's taunt

London, May 21 (ANI): England skipper Andrew Strauss refuses to be flustered by his Australian counterpart Ricky Ponting's taunt that he will be ruthlessly targeted by the Aussies.

Boldly declaring that Strauss would be Australia's No.1 target for the Ashes series, Ponting begun a merciless psychological campaign that has been used successfully against previous opposition leaders.

"Being captain, as we all know the Australian team tries to target the captain a little bit and put the captain of opposition teams under a bit more pressure. If you can do that, you can generally take another couple of the guys down with him," he said.

But Strauss, who scored five Test centuries during the winter and has just masterminded a 2-0 Test series crushing of West Indies, remains unconcerned about Ponting's taunt.

He was more interested in preparing for first one-day international against the Windies at Headingley than being sucked into Ponting's verbal spat, The Sun reported.

"I don't mind if Australia try to target me. It's something you expect from them but it's not something we're going to spend a lot of time concentrating on. We'd rather concentrate on our own preparation," Strauss said.

"To a certain extent, we can start planning better now we know the Australian squad - although we like to concentrate more on our own side. Australia will always be strong. The most important thing is that we play our conditions well.

"There is a lot of excitement in the air. Every day we get closer to the Ashes, attention turns towards the series. But there is a lot of other cricket first and it is important we focus on that," e added. (ANI)