Which ground in your country produces the best cricket ?

[Swervy]

3 days of exciting cricket? Sometimes. At other times it approaches farce (Pakistan 1999\2000, Pakistan 2004\05, England 2002\03).

3 teams just not good enough..hardly the pitches fault is it

 

[King_Ponting]

^^^lol yeh its much better watching cricket where ball apsolutely dominates bat rather than the reverse

 

[Mister Wright]

^^^lol yeh its much better watching cricket where ball apsolutely dominates bat rather than the reverse

I'm going to assume you weren't being sarcastic, because I agree.

 

[King_Ponting]

nah i wasnt being sarcastic. Good to see ball dominate bat once in a while

 

[PY]

Brings out the best of the best batsmen doesn't it?

The true definition of punishing the bad balls and leaving the good 'uns because on a fair few pitches around the world, it doesn't matter if it's a decent line and length because the pitches are so good that a batsman can just play his shots without having to think about what the pitch might do..

 

[Craig]

Ahhh, that's the Queenstown Events Centre - awesome place to watch cricket.

It's where I made my debut as a mascot.

I remember that game because of the picture of the Air New Zealand plane taking off in the back ground. They would surely have to stop play so the plane can take off without it being a problem for the bowlers or batsmen.

 

[FaaipDeOiad]

Well if you call exciting opening-up the doors for short-pitched bowling and high bounce to become wicket-taking weapons and regular three-day Test-matches, then, yes.

Short pitched bowling has always been a wicket-taking weapon, and everyone recognises it except for you.

Honestly, why do you think it is bowlers sometimes bowl short? Do you think they just do it by mistake over and over? Or are they just idiots have no idea what they are doing, unlike you? Why were fast bowling pairs who consistently bowled short and aggressively like Lillee/Thomson and Holding/Roberts so successful? Were they all "lucky" too?

 

[Pratters]

The best ground producing the best cricket for me has been the one in Toronto where India and Pakistan had those close one day encounters. Doubtful whether it would ever last 5 days and obviously I dont live in Canada.

Among Indian grounds :

Chennai : Closest matches with a lot of turn on the last day has given rise to classics

Bangalore : Good over all test cricket

Calcutta : The only ground where I have watched test/one day cricket plays true cricket with true bounce and a usually a good test match

Mohali : Now this is my favourite ground apart from Eden because of the awesome facilities, the outfield, the perfect bounce the pitch gives. Sadly, the good pitch turns out to be too good for test matches with a lot of draws. That has to change.

some world grounds :

Headingly : Superb venue for a good contest between the bat and the ball.

Perth and Kingsmead, Durban : Good to see the fast bowlers having some say some times, even if its at the expense of the batsmen.

Adelaide : A very good cricket venue with some thing for the fast bowlers early one, a batsman's paradise for a lot of the time with the spinners coming into the scheme of things later.

One ground I hate : Kandy runs runs sleep runs and more runs

 

[FaaipDeOiad]

3 days of exciting cricket? Sometimes. At other times it approaches farce (Pakistan 1999\2000, Pakistan 2004\05, England 2002\03).

How was 04/05 farcical? Did you actually see the match? I mean honestly, claiming there was anything at all wrong with that wicket is just riduclous. There was almost no lateral movement, the bounce was consistent and even, and batsmen who played well and applied themselves could make plenty of runs. Shoaib bowled very well on the first morning and got Australia in trouble before Langer played one of the best knocks of his career, and then Pakistan fell apart twice to some good bowling. McGrath's second innings spell was as good as I have ever seen anyone bowl on a wicket which really wasn't doing that much, and Pakistan were clueless against him. Most of his wickets in fact came with outswing and not with high bounce (certainly not uneven).

An example of a dangerous WACA wicket would be the one Ambrose demolished Australia on in 92/93, and that is one of the major highlights in my cricket watching life, so I certainly can't say I think it made for a poor match.

 

[Pratters]

Short pitched bowling has always been a wicket-taking weapon, and everyone recognises it except for you.

I really dont know how Richard would have reacted in the 70s and 80s when the Windies stream rolled the teams with short pitched stuff and forced cricket to change its rules.

 

[LongHopCassidy]

One ground I hate : Kandy runs runs sleep runs and more runs

Oh, Really?

 

[Pratters]

Oh, Really?

That was one weird test match.

Okay I checked out the test stats page for the ground http://statserver.cricket.org/guru?...ershigh=;event=0;submit=1;.cgifields=viewtype

I have been proven completely wrong. I dont know from where I got Kandy produces boring cricket with loads of runs. :raises up white flag:

 

[FaaipDeOiad]

I really dont know how Richard would have reacted in the 70s and 80s when the Windies stream rolled the teams with short pitched stuff and forced cricket to change its rules.

No doubt Roberts, Holding, Garner and Croft were just "lucky".

 

[Barney Rubble]

Taunton has a reputation for those of shrewd judgement of championing rubbish batsmen (Ian Blackwell being one of the best examples - check-out his average at Taunton compared to elsewhere).
It's a disgrace, bowlers haven't got a chance of bowling economically really.

In all fairness, I don't think many people regard Ian Blackwell as anything more than a bit of a one-trick pony. The only major scoring shot he really has is the "big slog over mid-wicket", so he's not exactly a proper batsman.

As for bowlers, Caddick and Johnson haven't done too badly in recent years, so I think it's a little hasty to say there's no chance for bowlers.

Taunton doesn't just champion rubbish batsmen you know, the conditions there are the same for everyone - they don't move the boundaries in once the fourth wicket goes down. Batsmen might score more runs there than away from home, but quality batsmen will score runs wherever they play, so it's the job of whoever Somerset's opposition are to take advantage of that. In the long run, all it affects is players' averages - and I'm sure it's been responsible for very, very few, if any, changes in international selection over the years, meaning unless you're obsessed with statistics, all it means is more runs and exciting cricket.

*cue diatribe from Richard about batsmen getting higher averages than they "deserve"*

 

[honestbharani]

How was 04/05 farcical? Did you actually see the match? I mean honestly, claiming there was anything at all wrong with that wicket is just riduclous. There was almost no lateral movement, the bounce was consistent and even, and batsmen who played well and applied themselves could make plenty of runs. Shoaib bowled very well on the first morning and got Australia in trouble before Langer played one of the best knocks of his career, and then Pakistan fell apart twice to some good bowling. McGrath's second innings spell was as good as I have ever seen anyone bowl on a wicket which really wasn't doing that much, and Pakistan were clueless against him. Most of his wickets in fact came with outswing and not with high bounce (certainly not uneven).

An example of a dangerous WACA wicket would be the one Ambrose demolished Australia on in 92/93, and that is one of the major highlights in my cricket watching life, so I certainly can't say I think it made for a poor match.

yep. Although, I think, in general, the WACA wickets have become flatter these days, in the early and mid 90s, it produced some classics. The 100s by Sachin and Lara there were absolutely fantastic to watch. One of the reasons why I have always rated those two as a class apart since then..

 

[Beleg]

National Stadium, Karachi.

 

[Deja moo]

National Stadium, Karachi.

If the pitch is still anywhere close to that 349-345 match pitch, I dont think so. I preferred the Rawalpindi pitch to that.

 

[Richard]

3 teams just not good enough..hardly the pitches fault is it

You could say the teams are not good enough, or you could say the pitch is not good enough.
Australia weren't good enough in Mumbai 2004\05, or the pitch wasn't good enough.
Or, better still, in both cases - both of them.

 

[Richard]

In all fairness, I don't think many people regard Ian Blackwell as anything more than a bit of a one-trick pony. The only major scoring shot he really has is the "big slog over mid-wicket", so he's not exactly a proper batsman.

Err, and that's effective quite a bit at Taunton, so he looks like he can bat - when in fact he's little more than a glorified tailender.

As for bowlers, Caddick and Johnson haven't done too badly in recent years, so I think it's a little hasty to say there's no chance for bowlers.

In recent years? Caddick and Johnson have both been woeful in recent years - indeed Taunton was the worst career move Johnson could have made.
Caddick might have been better at exploiting the Taunton pitch between 1990 and 2000, but he's hardly been great of late.

Taunton doesn't just champion rubbish batsmen you know, the conditions there are the same for everyone - they don't move the boundaries in once the fourth wicket goes down.

Well observed. But certain batsmen don't need short boundaries, some do.
So stupidly short boundaries will help some batsmen a little and a few a lot.

Batsmen might score more runs there than away from home, but quality batsmen will score runs wherever they play, so it's the job of whoever Somerset's opposition are to take advantage of that. In the long run, all it affects is players' averages - and I'm sure it's been responsible for very, very few, if any, changes in international selection over the years, meaning unless you're obsessed with statistics, all it means is more runs and exciting cricket.

More runs = exciting cricket? A MOO if ever there was one.
Ian Blackwell was selected for international cricket, wasn't he? If he'd moved anywhere except Somerset, he'd not have got near.
And believe it or not, some batsmen do actually take an interest - as do their fans - in how many runs they score.

 

[Richard]

nah i wasnt being sarcastic. Good to see ball dominate bat once in a while

It's good to see good bowling dominate bat, not any bowler who can get a bit of bounce dominate bat.