File photo of the Indian cricket team© AFP
The ICC has rated Chennai’s MA Chidambaram Stadium pitch, used for India’s Test match against Bangladesh, as “very good” with other four home centres used during the season being deemed “satisfactory”. In fact, all the three Test venues used against New Zealand — Bengaluru’s Chinnaswamy, Maharashtra Cricket Association Stadium in Pune’s Gahunje and Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai — just about managed “satisfactory” ratings from the ICC match referee. However, Kanpur’s Green Park stadium’s outfield has been rated “unsatisfactory” by the ICC match referee Jeff Crowe.
The government-owned stadium’s poor drainage system led to only two full days of play against Bangladesh and despite the pitch being rated “satisfactory”, the outfield didn’t escape the wrath of the former Kiwi international.
The high-scoring tracks at Gwalior, Delhi and Hyderabad used for Bangladesh T20Is were rated “very good”, as they conformed to the requirements of the shortest format.
However, the Indian team management, the BCCI and local curators wouldn’t be too amused to know that former Australia opener David Boon couldn’t rate any of the Test match tracks used against New Zealand beyond “satisfactory”.
The Chinnaswamy pitch had excessive moisture that led to India being all out for 46 against New Zealand while both Pune and Mumbai tracks were “rank turners”, which didn’t strictly follow the norms prescribed for a ‘Good Test’ match wicket.
But the two tracks escaped with satisfactory ratings because of some good individual batting performances from players of both sides.
India won the Test and T20I series against Bangladesh. However, India lost the three-match Test series against New Zealand. The Test series loss against New Zealand has hurt India real bad in its ambition to qualify for the World Test Championship final. India now need to win the Border Gavaskar Trophy against Australia 4-0 in order to qualify for the title clash on its own.
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