T20 World Cup: Poor pitches, due to bad planning and organisation, may end up further alienating USA from Cricket.
Delay in finalising New York venue and laying of pitch – prepared in Adelaide and allowed to grow in Florida - gave little time for it to settle and adjust to local conditions, and behaved quite dangerously at times.
Unusual protagonists have entered a T20 narrative; pitch, uneven bounce, seam, swing, fast bowlers, rib cage. It is as though India and Pakistan are resuming their Test ties in New York this Sunday, when they meet in the showpiece game of the World Cup. Only that the arch rivals are locked in peculiar circumstances, something the T20 world has seldom come across.
India's cricketers plays a shot against Ireland during an ICC Men's T20 World Cup cricket match at the Nassau County International Cricket Stadium in Westbury, New York, Wednesday, June 5, 2024.
At the heart of the intrigue are the drop-in pitches that have been far from ideal for a T20 game or a tournament that is seen as cricket’s grand pitch to enter the US market. Largely untested because of the delay in laying them – thanks to the organisational ineptitude of the ICC and USA cricket board – they have been dangerously unpredictable so far. In the India vs Ireland game on Wednesday, at the same venue, India skipper Rohit Sharma and Rishabh Pant suffered blows on the body because of balls taking off from a good length. Earlier in the same game, a delivery from new-ball bowler Arshdeep Singh had skidded all along the surface.
After the win over Ireland, Rohit wasn’t sure about the kind of pitch they would get for the Pakistan game. “It’s a new ground, a new venue, with a drop-in pitch. We weren’t really aware of what it would be like to play on a pitch that’s just five months old. It was all about getting used to the conditions… I don’t think the wicket settled down even when we batted second.”
Others have been more brutal in their assessment of the track. Calling the surface substandard, former England captain Michael Vaughan wrote on X: “Trying to sell the game in the states is great… love it… but for players to have to play on this sub-standard surface in New York is unacceptable…You work so hard to make it to the WC then have to play on this.”
Wasim Jaffer was sarcastic: “This is an excellent pitch, provided the idea was selling Test cricket to the Americans.”
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