*Official* Sri Lanka in India

[Notorious1]

Another borring run fest.

 

[G.I.Joe]

It just looks like an attempt to render Indian groundsmen not responsible for doing their bit to kill test cricket. Clive Lloyd and the ICC are doing their bit too, obviously, but you can't excuse the groundsmen either. It's not a straight choice between a pure dustbowl and a cricket-killer.

No, its not, but when its a question of you being solely responsible for the potential black-listing of the cricket association and ground that employs you, its easy to see why he would err on the side of caution. You get censured for producing turning tracks, but not for producing roads. Why leave it to chance?

 

[Cruxdude]

Well obviously no one here thinks that playing 3 spinners on a first day track, who bowl 58 out of 90 overs against Sehwag and Gambhir has anything to do with the score. While I accept there have been more than a few flat tracks in India, give the pitch some chance before castigating it.

 

[Manee]

Another borring run fest.

Hard to say, until India bowl.

 

[Furball]

Well obviously no one here thinks that playing 3 spinners on a first day track, who bowl 58 out of 90 overs against Sehwag and Gambhir has anything to do with the score. While I accept there have been more than a few flat tracks in India, give the pitch some chance before castigating it.

Correct.

I only watched the first session, there didn't look like there was much in the pitch for the quicks but Sehwag and Gambhir had to be watchful and play carefully. Once they'd played themselves in, they went to town on some frankly poor spin bowling.

Given that even the greatest spinners have stuggled in India, when Mendis bowls full tosses and half trackers is it any suprise that Sehwag was smashing him into the stands?

 

[Sir Alex]

I watched game today and I think Sehwag and Gambhir were brilliant. I don't think pitch might be a huge factor. Sehwag can dominate on any pitch. He was in that mood. Had he been caught in the first over, we owuld have been talking differently.

 

[Sanz]

How much do you know of pitch preparation anyway?


And no it is not.. But when wickets have their own character and that makes them a dustbowl, you don't want that. So you try to water it up and flatten it and harden it and then it becomes a road and you do not want that either. So what do you want? Wild guess: a greentop.... How is that good for cricket?

I have to agree with this. It is so easy to criticize the groundsmen for pitches esp by those who have never set foot in the country and have no idea how hard the climate is to make a perfect pitch in certain parts of the country..

It is even more silly to compare Indian Groundsmen to the groundsmen in NZ.

 

[Burgey]

Can't speak for anyone else and I haven't seen this game at all, but for me it's not so much whether a pitch has a certain characteristic, rather that so many pitches around the world these days are of the same type, namely roads.

Too much of anything gets boring (except *** and money ). If there were pitches everywhere that were greentops I'd find it boring, same if wickets everywhere were all turners.

The homogenisation of pitches here in Australia is one of the worst things ever for our cricket imo, but they want tests to go 5 days for the coin. As is so often the case, money rules.

 

[Burgey]

No, its not, but when its a question of you being solely responsible for the potential black-listing of the cricket association and ground that employs you, its easy to see why he would err on the side of caution. You get censured for producing turning tracks, but not for producing roads. Why leave it to chance?

This strikes me as a very good point.

 

[Craig]

Can't speak for anyone else and I haven't seen this game at all, but for me it's not so much whether a pitch has a certain characteristic, rather that so many pitches around the world these days are of the same type, namely roads.

Too much of anything gets boring (except *** and money ). If there were pitches everywhere that were greentops I'd find it boring, same if wickets everywhere were all turners.

The homogenisation of pitches here in Australia is one of the worst things ever for our cricket imo, but they want tests to go 5 days for the coin. As is so often the case, money rules.

AWTA.

Isn't Sangakkara due a massive knock by now?

 

[Uppercut]

Can't speak for anyone else and I haven't seen this game at all, but for me it's not so much whether a pitch has a certain characteristic, rather that so many pitches around the world these days are of the same type, namely roads.

Too much of anything gets boring (except *** and money ). If there were pitches everywhere that were greentops I'd find it boring, same if wickets everywhere were all turners.

The homogenisation of pitches here in Australia is one of the worst things ever for our cricket imo, but they want tests to go 5 days for the coin. As is so often the case, money rules.

Australian pitches tend to bring results though, for whatever reason. It's just as easy to score runs but they're not so painfully slow. There's nothing worse than seeing a bowler take the batsman's edge time and time again only for it to drop short of first slip.

In any case, it's always good to reserve judgment of a pitch until both teams have batted. But I'm not optimistic.

 

[TT Boy]

Newsflash: you're not a colony anymore. You don't have to do what other countries say.

Besides, remember Smith and Arthur being perfectly diplomatic when they encountered that dustbowl last year.

As opposed to Kumble when India were ambushed second test. But of course it’s Australia and South Africa’s fault for the benign surfaces being produced.

India given how poor their spin stocks are can no longer get away with preparing square turners, only if they are facing the likes of South Africa. Sri Lanka would dick them, even with Murali being close to finished, Herath being a hack and Mendis decoded. And they would have lost the first test by an innings if Sri Lanka had anything close to a decent seam attack.

 

[Burgey]

Australian pitches tend to bring results though, for whatever reason. It's just as easy to score runs but they're not so painfully slow. There's nothing worse than seeing a bowler take the batsman's edge time and time again only for it to drop short of first slip.

In any case, it's always good to reserve judgment of a pitch until both teams have batted. But I'm not optimistic.

I think though, that Australia's ability to get results on the flattened out pitches we've had in the past 10 or so years was mostly because of the quality of the bowlers we had in McGrath, Warne and to no small extent Gillespie. SA beat us here in circumstances where Australia had the winning of the two tests they lost, but could not bowl SA out. SA also had a better seam attack than we did in that series IMO.

The current Aussie attack has really only achieved success on surfaces which assist them - SA and at Headingly on the Ashes tour. As an Australian supporter I'm hoping they develop into an attack which can perform on all surfaces, but we'll just have to wait and see if they do.

I guess what I'm saying is that perhaps the fact Australian pitches have given up results more often than others has more to do witht he quality of the attack(s) that have prevailed here rather than the fact the pitches have more in them than elsewhere.

 

[Pothas]

AWTA.

Isn't Sangakkara due a massive knock by now?

Yeah bound to happen, keep thinking maybe this pitch is not as good as it seems and India batting and Sri Lankan bowling have just made it look that way but any way you look at it this is a good one and someone and given the amount of quality batsmen and relatively mediocre bowlers someone in the Sri Lankan side is bound to get a big score.

 

[Craig]

Yeah bound to happen, keep thinking maybe this pitch is not as good as it seems and India batting and Sri Lankan bowling have just made it look that way but any way you look at it this is a good one and someone and given the amount of quality batsmen and relatively mediocre bowlers someone in the Sri Lankan side is bound to get a big score.

Jayawardene came off a knock of 275 and his namesake scored 154, and Dilshan bashed his way to a century in the last Test. This is not going to look pretty for the Indian bowlers when it is their turn to bowl. Of course the opposite can happen, but I'm not confident of the latter happening.

 

[Uppercut]

I think though, that Australia's ability to get results on the flattened out pitches we've had in the past 10 or so years was mostly because of the quality of the bowlers we had in McGrath, Warne and to no small extent Gillespie. SA beat us here in circumstances where Australia had the winning of the two tests they lost, but could not bowl SA out. SA also had a better seam attack than we did in that series IMO.

The current Aussie attack has really only achieved success on surfaces which assist them - SA and at Headingly on the Ashes tour. As an Australian supporter I'm hoping they develop into an attack which can perform on all surfaces, but we'll just have to wait and see if they do.

I guess what I'm saying is that perhaps the fact Australian pitches have given up results more often than others has more to do witht he quality of the attack(s) that have prevailed here rather than the fact the pitches have more in them than elsewhere.

All true, but nonetheless, if the results are still coming then there isn't a problem that particularly needs to be fixed. Once we get test series ending in 0-0 draws in Australia then it'll be fair to give their ground staff an earful.

There is generally some pace and decent bounce, too. Rarely see such a slow pitch in Australia, except perhaps at Adelaide.

 

[Cruxdude]

As opposed to Kumble when India were ambushed second test. But of course it’s Australia and South Africa’s fault for the benign surfaces being produced.

India given how poor their spin stocks are can no longer get away with preparing square turners, only if they are facing the likes of South Africa. Sri Lanka would dick them, even with Murali being close to finished, Herath being a hack and Mendis decoded. And they would have lost the first test by an innings if Sri Lanka had anything close to a decent seam attack.

Dumb

 

[Craig]

All true, but nonetheless, if the results are still coming then there isn't a problem that particularly needs to be fixed. Once we get test series ending in 0-0 draws in Australia then it'll be fair to give their ground staff an earful.

There is generally some pace and decent bounce, too. Rarely see such a slow pitch in Australia, except perhaps at Adelaide.

Sydney as well. It only happens in Adelaide came day 4 and 5, when it becomes pointless to try and duck any sort of bouncers, unless it really takes off and goes over your head. I'm sure you remember Tendulkar getting out lbw in Adelaide in 1999 when trying to duck a bouncer and it hit him in the shoulder. Had seen anything like it before (I never saw Chris Read earlier in that year getting bowled when trying to duck a Chris Cairns slower bowl, since we never had the coverage) at that time.

 

[Jono]

All true, but nonetheless, if the results are still coming then there isn't a problem that particularly needs to be fixed. Once we get test series ending in 0-0 draws in Australia then it'll be fair to give their ground staff an earful.

To be fair, many Indian test series have ended with 1-1 or 2-0 etc. in recent times.

People underestimate how much an effect good bowling has, even on flat tracks.

Shoaib Akhtar was a wrecking machine (assisted by a Kaneria bowling well and England being dumb asses) at home against England in 2005/6. But those pitches were still flat as hell.

 

[TT Boy]

Dumb

So Indian test pitches are not lifeless, Kumble did not whinge, the groundsman was not pilloried in the media for producing a result wicket, India do have good spin stocks, Sri Lanka have a good pace attack, Murali is not finished, Herath is world class and Mendis hasn’t been found out?