Era of flat pitches

[Craig]

What is up with cricket boards so obessed with flat batting wickets.?

In the subcontentient you bat first generally if you win the toss, same in the Caribbean, and I would say at most Australian grounds if not all.

At Newlands and the Bullring generally IMO they are flat good batting wickets with their lightening fast outfields.

And for some reason England has followed this trend by going for flat easy batting wickets.

I must say what is wrong with the odd green top in Test cricket? IMO they are more exciting and more challenging for batsmen.

 

[luckyeddie]

Uncovered pitches!!!

Yay!!!

Bring Derek Underwood out of mothballs.

 

[iamdavid]

For the boards & TV networks it is essential to get test matches which go the full 5 days , decks which provide any undue assistance to the bowlers are not gonna help acheive this & as a result they're becoming less & less frequent.

I wouldnt mind the odd one , they do add another dimension to the match , playing against an accurate attack on a green surface sorts the real top class batsman from the pretenders , sadly the current crop are unlikely to be tested more than a couple of dozen time over their entire carears.

 

[abe]

It could be the belief that exciting cricket = lots of runs = what people want to see. A challenging pitch generally means a slow run rate.

Uncovered pitches

 

[deeps]

most of us are genuine cricket lovers.. We love to watch a tough battle between the fielding side and batting side...watching the bowler try to outfox the batsman etc.

However, there are lots of ppl out there that watch cricket,not for the strategical and tactical side,but for pure entertainment.. They get easily bored when there's nothing happening in a game.

I think there's more of the latter than the former,and hence the cricket boards try accommodate for the majority

 

[Craig]

True but lots of runs can be boring if you looked at that side of the arguement.

To be a cricket fan and be able to watch it all day and think about the game you must have certain level of high attention span.

would love to see Matt Hayden bat on a absolute green top. That would prove how great that he is.

Low scoring matches are generally entertaining.

 

[Craig]

most of us are genuine cricket lovers.. We love to watch a tough battle between the fielding side and batting side...watching the bowler try to outfox the batsman etc.

However, there are lots of ppl out there that watch cricket,not for the strategical and tactical side,but for pure entertainment.. They get easily bored when there's nothing happening in a game.

I think there's more of the latter than the former,and hence the cricket boards try accommodate for the majority

Isnt there what OD cricket is for?

 

[Eclipse]

would love to see Matt Hayden bat on a absolute green top. That would prove how great that he is.

I have seen Mat Hayden make a stack of run's on Gabba green top's over the years for queensland.

It's not international standerd but he always delt fairly well with the conditions I thought.

These days though I do think batsman are not as good at batting on greentop's or poor wickets as they were in 10 years ago.

The modern age batsman like Ricky Ponting for example tend to drive on the rise alot more than players did 10 years ago and usualy they get away with it because the pitches are of good quality.

 

[James]

I must say what is wrong with the odd green top in Test cricket? IMO they are more exciting and more challenging for batsmen.

Come and watch the upcoming test series between New Zealand and Pakistan then Craig.

Another summer of crap pitches and low scores is definately on the cards :!(

 

[Craig]

It will be on cable James so yes I will be able to see it.

 

[mavric41]

Most batting sides are so crap they need flat pitches to have some chance.

 

[luckyeddie]

Most batting sides are so crap they need flat pitches to have some chance.

Quite the reverse.

They need to practice batting on less manicured surfaces to develop decent foot movement, the ability to play the ball off the wicket etc.

 

[mavric41]

Quite the reverse.

They need to practice batting on less manicured surfaces to develop decent foot movement, the ability to play the ball off the wicket etc.

I agree. But do they?

 

[Swanny]

In many ways i'm pleased I watch my cricket in England. I much prefer watching cricket when wickets are tumbling. I appreciate that the pitches must be good enough so they have to work for runs, but some of these flat lifeless pitches produce boring cricket.

I've watched the vast majority of this England v Sri Lanka series and have to say it hasn't been that exciting. Test cricket can be attritional at times but I just don't think these pitches have suited interesting cricket or certainly the sort of cricket I enjoy watching.

 

[Mr Mxyzptlk]

In many ways i'm pleased I watch my cricket in England. I much prefer watching cricket when wickets are tumbling. I appreciate that the pitches must be good enough so they have to work for runs, but some of these flat lifeless pitches produce boring cricket.

I've watched the vast majority of this England v Sri Lanka series and have to say it hasn't been that exciting. Test cricket can be attritional at times but I just don't think these pitches have suited interesting cricket or certainly the sort of cricket I enjoy watching.

Um, the Eng/SL series hasn't exactly been dominated by batsmen thus far.

 

[Swanny]

But it hasn't exactly been sparkling cricket either. I'm just not a fan of these slow lifeless pitches where batsman can hang around for seemignly as long as they like but actually scoring runs is very difficult. I appreciate you have to play in the conditions your presented with but its not much fun for the spectator.

 

[Langeveldt]

Interesting topic...

Test cricket is supposed to be a battle, a war of attrition, not one way traffic, and as a bowler i wouldnt be relishing the thought of bowling on some of the aussie pitches, and increasingly SA ones...
Save all the belters and batting glory for the one day game, thats what people pay money to see...

 

[anzac]

so what is the criteria for a good test pitch?????

it used to be something like -
Day 1 = some assistance for the seam bowlers to reward good bowling, but still capable of scoring runs if the batsmen wanted to take them on or punish the bad delivery;
Day 2 = good batting surface - good bowling disciplines req'd, best batting PM Day 2 - AM Day 3;
Day 3 = still good batting but starting to wear & slow down a bit;
Day 4 = pitch starting to get variation in bounce as surface wears more & takes turn;
Day 5 = tough for batting again as pace & bounce inconsistant, more turn experienced.

With the above formula you have advantages & disadvantages batting 1st or 2nd so far as days 1 v 5 go. Currently there is more of anadvantage to bat 1st and post a huge total. The main criteria with all this is that the pitch has consistant pace & carry until it wears, so as to encourage both the seam bowlers and the batsmen.

A good ODI pitch used to be described as a Day 3 Test pitch.

I don't want to loose the pace & bounce in the wicket, but I think what we have lost is the 'life' from Day 1 pitches, & the wear & tear effect on Days 4 & 5. IMO current pitches start off more like an AM Day 2 pitch used to be like, and don't wear as much so batting conditions are fairly consistant right thru to Day 5, and Day 5 pitches are still like PM Day 4 used to be like.

The current conditions allow for more stroke play, but only if the pitch has pace & carry, otherwise you end up with batsmen not able to play shots & bowlers unable to take / create wicket taking opportunities.

Having the pitches uncovered during the 5 days of a Test would bring some life back into them, but the down side is the length of the season would have an adverse effect - can you imagine what the NZ pitches v India would have been like uncovered!!!!!!!! Perhaps this could be restricted to the 'true' summer months......

 

[luckyeddie]

It's rare that I agree totally with anyone (cos I'm a pedant) but Anzac has described perfectly my idea of a five-day wicket.

One thing about uncovered pitches, though - it's not universally true that the rain made them difficult - if the pitch was a 'flier' in the first place, rain tended to 'deaden' it a little.

 

[anzac]

It's rare that I agree totally with anyone (cos I'm a pedant) but Anzac has described perfectly my idea of a five-day wicket.

One thing about uncovered pitches, though - it's not universally true that the rain made them difficult - if the pitch was a 'flier' in the first place, rain tended to 'deaden' it a little.

why thanx LE..........

my point re the NZ pitches last season was they would have been like playing on Eden Park in the waterlogged Test v Scotland at the begining of play, and then freshened up as the sun & wind kicked in later in the day - not a lot for the spectators to watch.......if they had of had a hard base with pace & bounce to start with they could have been leathal to bat on - like some of the old pitches as per Bodyline or the Tangiwhai Disaster series in SA.

The more I think about it the more I'm sure that the issue needs to be addressed. My reasoning being that we are not seeing a big difference in team selections from Test to ODIs as we used to, and in Tests we are in danger of loosing players such as Richardson or Boycott etc, because their scoring rate does not fit into the 'qucik runs' strategy - as per the Aussies target of 4 RPO in Tests!!!

Hell when ODIs took off in the '80s 4-4.5 RPO was often good enough to win their fare share of matches & there were often games won with scores defended around 180 odd!!!!