Pictures expose ridiculous pitch preparation
The Australian team sensed something was wrong with the Nagpur pitch they are set to face India on in two days – but after they left the stadium the real dirty work began.
The pitch doctor is in the house and the prognosis is grim for left handed visitors ahead of Thursday’s first Test.
The Australian team thought something was going on with the pitch when they trained two days out from the first Test of the Border Gavaskar trophy, but they should have seen what happened when they left the Nagpur stadium.
Later in the afternoon, as the Indian hierarchy stood around, the curators embarked on one of the more extraordinary pitch preparations.
The centre of the Nagpur wicket was watered and rolled. The area on a good length for left handers was left to parch in the heat and was avoided by the machinery.
Five members of Australia’s likely top seven — Usman Khawaja, David Warner, Travis Head, Matthew Renshaw, and Alex Carey — bat left handed.
The state of the pitch could see right-handed Peter Handscomb enter the frame to be picked to bat at No. 6 over Renshaw.
The BCCI now sends official curators to oversee the preparation of wickets.
All signs point to utter carnage when play gets underway in Nagpur, where batting first will likely be a major advantage.
Nagpur has been a spinner’s paradise in recent times, with Gujurat collapsing to be all out for just 54 against Vidarbha in India’s Ranji Trophy competition in at the same venue just last month.
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