Even before a ball was bowled in the 2023 edition of the Border-Gavaskar Trophy, the talks of ‘doctored pitches’ took the centre-stage.
The ground staff at VCA stadium in Nagpur was seen preparing the pitch for the first Test with some selective watering, leading to Australian media accusing the hosts of doctoring the surface to trouble the visiting team’s left-handed batters.
As it turned out, the tourists were bundled out for a paltry 177 on Day 1 of the opening Test at VCA Stadium in Nagpur. No Aussie batters managed to hit a half-century as India’s spin duo of Ravindra Jadeja (5/47) and R Ashwin (3/42) ran through their batting line-up.
After the first day’s day, Australia legend Ricky Ponting shared his two cents on the much-debated Nagpur track.
“I expected today's wicket to play like it has. I got a look at it like everyone did a few days ago, and that's when all the talk started about the surface. But India's best chance of beating Australia is to prepare turning wickets. One, because our batsmen will find it difficult, but also because they would think that their spin bowlers are better than Australia's as well.
“And the fact that Australia are playing the two right-arm off-spinners here, one of those guys on debut. That's definitely where India have the advantage. So I can understand why it's worked out that way,” Ponting told The ICC Review.
However, Ponting added that in Australia, the players or Cricket Australia didn’t have a say on the kind of pitches they wanted.
“The only difference I guess with somewhere like India to Australia is, I know in Australia the players actually have no say over how the wickets are prepared at all,” he said.
“Unless things have changed the last couple of years, when I was playing, and certainly after I'd finished, the captains or anyone from Cricket Australia never even spoke to the groundsmen. You just left it up to the groundsmen to prepare the best wicket that they could.
“The beauty of playing Test match cricket in Australia is every venue's wicket is vastly different. Perth and Brisbane are two of the faster, bouncier wickets in Australia, where you understand the ball's going to swing and seem a little bit.
“Then you get Melbourne and Sydney, they're a little bit different. Melbourne's always been a little bit slower and Adelaide has been the place where you've played the pink-ball Test the last six or seven years. So you get different conditions there as well.”
India left out in-form Shubman Gill and picked KL Rahul as Rohit’s opening partner. Ponting felt it was an “interesting” choice by the hosts.
“Shubman’s obviously coming in red-hot form,” he said. “Everything he's done lately in the white-ball game has been quite remarkable. We saw him in Australia a couple of summers ago and he played really well, and looked at home most of the time in Australian conditions.”
“It could even be as simple as that. What does Shubman Gill average against the ball spinning in and what does KL Rahul average against the ball spinning in?”
“I think when you get in conditions like this and you, and you're starting to look at numbers, and strengths and weaknesses, I think you have to dig really deep to make sure you are picking the right players for the right game.”
Ravindra Jadeja starred with the ball for India on Day 1, returning with a five-wicket haul. Marnus Labuschagne (49), Steve Smith (37), Matt Renshaw (0), Peter Handscomb (31) and debutant Todd Murphy (0) were his victims.
“Because of how he [Jadeja] bowls on those sort of wickets – the pace that he bowls, the line that he bowls to right-handers in particular, where he is pitching the ball on the stumps all the time, and one would turn and one will slide on, like we saw, with the dismissal of Steven Smith today.
“I mean they're two identical deliveries. One just happened to turn and the other one went straight on and went back through the gate and bowled him.”
After seeing Jadeja’s exploits, Ponting feels the four-match Test series could be a “nightmare” for the Pat Cummins-led side.
“As the series goes on, if his body holds up and he can get through the four Test matches, I think he could very well be the leading wicket-taker in this entire series."
(With ICC Inputs)
