SA tour of India, Sept 29-Dec 7

[Arthur Crabtree]

Healthy SR for Tahir.

[Aidan11]

Big ask for Tahir to survive tonight.

[Aidan11]

No more scares to stumps.

32/2. SA need a miracle.

[hopeforthebest]

I had to make a double take to confirm this was only day two of this test. I see tweets on cricinfo use the term diabolical to describe this pitch.

[meninblue]

What a wonderful position we are in this test match. South African pacers bowl bouncers to our batsmen and they test our batsmen with fast paced short pitch bowling by preparing pace friendly wickets, now here we are testing their batsmen on front foot using flight and turn with 3 spin bowlers on spin friendly wicket.

[Dr Cricket]

lord 2014 was by far more cheating.
Even though india won the test clearly the toss was far more crucial considering the par score was 150 in the first innings and batting got easing in the 2nd innings.
india could have lost the test match for no fault of their own.
At least here both teams have the same conditions.

[Dr Cricket]

but saying that the pitches was far over the top but I wouldn't go far as saying it was cheating or it should get a ban especially when it is SA making the pitch look far more awful than it is.

it really should be the 2012/13 type pitches where it more of a day 3 pitch and not day 4/5.
but in Sub C the pitches should turn on day 1 but only slightly when it does that the pitches are the best since it has enough help for Spinners, Reverse swing and good batsman can score runs.

It seemed like india were scared of Amla and De villers the only reason I can see them preparing day 5 type pitches.
By the way it is not cheating since lets not forget England and all the other teams prepare pitches to overcome the other team strength and suit their weakness.
England prepared a typical English wickets this summer didn't see people complaing when aus were 60 all out.

[Arthur Crabtree]

Don't think they were typical English pitches. They were greentops, made to order.

[Dr Cricket]

Don't think they were typical English pitches. They were greentops, made to order.

exactly if anything that is more cheating since grass or way more than normal makes toss so crucial since batting gets easier and often team batting 2nd has a huge advantage.


anyway Greyblazer posting lots of sense on twitter, batsmans have made it looked far more worse than it really is.
Mumbai 2012 was probably a similar wicket and that was classic game.
Both teams have lots of answers to address with batting against spin when it actually turns.

[Arthur Crabtree]

It's one thing that SA can bat on it. But the home team are struggling too against spinners of no real repute. I don't find it easy to believe that the batters of both sides are incompetent. Both sides have world class batters, and both have other good batters. Rather average spinners are prospering. If India have prepared pitches to give themselves an advantage, then it's no more than England in particular are guilty of. And home advantage is an issue at the moment. We expect Indian type pitches, and I don't mind bowlers' pitches. But we might as well own up to what they are.

[Dr Cricket]

No question about it but kohli and banger plus Indian experts have picked up that the current lot are struggling with the turn. Have to remember this team lost at galle in a similar pitch.

Think kohli said the batsman have to learn since this is the type of pitches India will play in for 18 months

[Arthur Crabtree]

Turn and variable bounce. Anyone will struggle.

[ianp1970]

I had to make a double take to confirm this was only day two of this test. I see tweets on cricinfo use the term diabolical to describe this pitch.

Maybe they need to introduce the LVCC Div 2 provisional new rules here too

[The Professor]

If India keep their fielding tight they will win this. So many dropped catches today. South African batsmen going to be hard against it.

It is a shame that the 'pitch debate' may take away from Jadeja and Ashwin's heroics with the ball.

Let's forget about the pitch and talk about the cricket though.

Pujara played a fine innings

[Dr Cricket]

might be watching another game but not sure their was loads of variable bounce, looks like more of variable speed was troubling batsman.

Mumbai 2012 was far more tough same amount of turn and bounce.