New Delhi: The cricket team from India has reportedly aired their concerns about the subpar state of the practice grounds in Melbourne ahead of the much-anticipated Boxing Day Test match, as noted by PTI. The team highlighted the ill-maintained pitches leading to erratic bounce, which they believe has resulted in skipper Rohit Sharma suffering a knee injury.
In preparation for the fourth Test match on Boxing Day at the Melbourne Cricket Ground, both Australia and India are eager and ready to square off. An unfortunate incident occurred during a training session. Rohit Sharma, part of the visiting team, suffered a blow to his left knee while attempting to play a shot. He was later seen using an ice pack on his knee to soothe the swelling that resulted from the impact. As a result, he remained off the nets for the rest of the session. Meanwhile, another player, Akash Deep, also dealt with a minor knock during practice. Yet, despite these incidents, there doesn’t appear to be any serious concern over their injuries.
The Indian squad isn’t exactly thrilled about the quality of the training pitches, but MCG’s groundskeeper, Matt Page, assures everyone that he followed all the required guidelines. Despite the Indian team handing over their training plan a good two months ahead, Page remained firm on the normal protocol: new training pitch is given only a trisect of days before the December 26th Test match.
“So for us, three days out, we prepare pitches for here. If teams come and play before that, they get what pitches we’ve had,” Page told media when asked why Team India didn’t get a pitch that would resemble the centre pitch.
“So today, we’re on fresh pitches. If we needed to play this morning, they would have been on those fresh pitches. Stock standard procedure for us, three days out. We do our pitches that we’re going to have for our Test match,” Page said while defending the decision.
He confirmed that they were given the schedule before the series. “Yes, they gave us a schedule. There has been correspondence between CA and Indian board and the extent of those conversations, I don’t know,” said Page.
The curator emphasized that the pitch is going to favor the bowlers, which will pose a tough challenge for the batsmen unless they can successfully navigate the initial threats from the new ball.Seven years ago, we were quite flat, we want to create exciting a contest and exciting Test matches, so we will leave more grass, which brings the bowlers into the equation.
“But it is still good for batting once the new ball goes off. We keep 6mm grass and we would monitor that as we get in,” Page elaborated.
