February 22, 2012 04:54 GMT

Hailing his former captain Ricky Ponting as a "great ambassador" for cricket, Australia speedster Brett Lee said the Tasmanian batsman, who is out of reckoning for One-Day Internationals, would be sorely missed in the dressing room.

"Ricky Ponting has been a wonderful teammate, he has been a great ambassador for the game and a brilliant cricketer, almost akin to Sachin Tendulkar," Lee said.

"In his press conference on Tuesday morning, he said that he doesn't expect to play one-day cricket ever again. So I think that he has got that through his mind that he will not get a chance to play in ODIs anymore.

"In the end, it comes down to the selection panel to see what they want to do, and I know he understands fully, as he said in his press conference, that he doesn't expect to play the 50-over format ever again. That said, he can now focus solely on playing in the longer form of the game," Lee told CastrolCricket.com, a media release said.

He said the two-time World Cup-winning Australian skipper would be sorely missed in the team's camp and also pointed out the oddity that he was stand-in captain in one game (the previous one played by Australia against India at Brisbane on Sunday) and out of ODI cricket in the next.

"Ricky is obviously going to be sorely missed in the Australian camp. The dressing room will seem quiet and empty now without him. It's quite a weird feeling actually to think that he won't be around in one day cricket, because he has always been there. He would never really get injured, so it is going to be strange without him.

"He added a lot of value to the team both as player and captain. Even though Michael Clarke had taken over captaincy recently, Punter always offered a lot of inputs about the way the team was and ways of getting batsmen out. He was a big team player and he was always there for the young guys coming in the team, and that will surely be missed," Lee said.