*Official* 3rd Test at the Sardar Patel Sports Complex, Ahmedabad, 24 - 28 Feb 2021

[Spark]

There are different ways to skin the cat, really. I felt Virat looked the most in control among those who batted in this game, but Rohit and Crawley are both guys who can get a lot of runs quickly even if they miss a few balls. Smith can bat in either tempo and do it really well but can also present a lot of chances doing so. KW technically looks the best bet of the Fab 4 but for some reason, has not performed as well away from home. Root has the best performances in recent times and when he gets going he looks impossible to get out but as we saw, in these conditions, even he struggles often. Virat looks good but has not made a big score in these conditions. But I feel all of them have their own ways to get runs in these conditions. Rohit is definitely most dangerous as he can get them very quickly but I wont write off any of the fab 4 in such conditions either.

I must be missing something but I feel that Kohli doesn't have the greatest record on out-and-out turners? I could be overweighting that 2017 series which was on turners and he got 0 runs though

Might be one of the ATG bad captaincy series from both sides. Cook had Plunkett bowl an entire spell of bouncers from round the wicket on one of the greenest decks this century on day 1 iirc.

That was pretty bad but Broad and Anderson banging it halfway down before lunch on that pitch having sent the oppo in can't be blamed on the captain. Textbook "how not to bowl on a greentop" on that first morning by England

 

[sunilz]

Pitch was a disgrace tbh . Wins on pitches like this undo all the good will earned after series win in AUS. IND can beat this Eng side on normal wickets. There is no need to doctor pitches like this.

 

[trundler]

I'm not sure how much of it was doctored and how much it it was just under-prepared. Remember there being chat about the new Optus pitch being poor during its international debut. Sample size of 2 and a pretty random parallel but new grounds don't open every week so I'm working with what I've got. Just looks like the ground staff dropped the ball.

 

[Kirkut]

This was a brutal pitch. Maybe even the 1990s never saw such pitches.

 

[trundler]

This was a brutal pitch. Maybe even the 1990s never saw such pitches.

More like 1890s

 

[sunilz]

This was a brutal pitch. Maybe even the 1990s never saw such pitches.

Nah . 90s always had pitches like this.
Both team are very poor players of spin.

 

[cnerd123]

Joe Root thinks the pink ball is skiddier somehow and that's why they missed so many straight balls

Interesting tstl.

 

[Shri]

maybe start a blog on gardening.

nice

bringing the topic back to the pitch

 

[Ashwinashwath]

Pitch was a disgrace tbh . Wins on pitches like this undo all the good will earned after series win in AUS. IND can beat this Eng side on normal wickets. There is no need to doctor pitches like this.

Once India tried a spinning track a decade ago and Monty Panesar singh made it an edge favouring England. So it is not the pitch to be blamed but the players mettle under question.

 

[Kirkut]

More like 1890s

I thought proper rank turners were a thing of past and even refused to consider the Mumbai test match where Clarke got six wickets to be a rank turner.
Feel sorry for England fans here, it's kind of identical to our NZ tour in 2002 when pitches were green with strong winds and plenty of clouds.

 

[honestbharani]

So India will face NZ in the Cup finals if they even draw the next match. India will obliterate NZ and go on to rule cricketing world for the next decade.

Dude, I understand counter trolling but almost all English posters have been outstanding here. There is seriously no need to post like this. England played very well even here to be in the game till the last couple of sessions.

On that note, I predicted that their bowling will do well here but their batting is what will let them down, but I definitely did not expect Root to do that. He bowled very very well, lets not forget that in all the discussions about the pitch.

 

[trundler]

I thought proper rank turners were a thing of past and even refused to consider the Mumbai test match where Clarke got six wickets to be a rank turner.
Feel sorry for England fans here, it's kind of identical to our NZ tour in 2002 when pitches were green with strong winds and plenty of clouds.

@Flem274* to comment

 

[KungFu_Kallis]

Very good pitch to bat on according to Kohli. Guess we were all wrong. ??‍

 

[karan_fromthestands]

I mean as with the Australian innings after 36ao, once a side is mentally out of the game, the lack of competitiveness kind of outweighs all other considerations and the cricket no longer becomes representative of the pitch conditions and batting will look waaaay easier for the side chasing the small total than it really is (Joe Burns got a fifty ffs). Similar here; England were clearly checked out psychologically after getting shot out and the result was foregone. That doesn't negate what happened beforehand, in which thirty wickets fell for roughly three hundred runs in five sessions of play. That's enough to come to a pretty firm conclusion as to what batting on that was like.

I totally agree with it, but the talk about the pitch in the last game got a little toned down once India scored some runs on it. This pitch was not too different IMO, we wouldn't be talking that much about the pitch had India played positively in the first innings.

Overall, I do agree it was tough to bat on and it was in favour of the bowlers.

 

[Kirkut]

Seriously as a fast bowler all you need is to practice some batting to warm up, anyways you're not getting to bowl on these wickets.

 

[GIMH]

Haha, are you really saying you can't get to 200 or 250 on this pitch given how insipid England were in the first innings and still got to 112?

Joe Root took 5/8

 

[White Ball]

India once again outplaying England. Great performance from the home team! 3-1 most likely result now

 

[Spark]

I totally agree with it, but the talk about the pitch in the last game got a little toned down once India scored some runs on it. This pitch was not too different IMO, we wouldn't be talking that much about the pitch had India played positively in the first innings.

Overall, I do agree it was tough to bat on and it was in favour of the bowlers, but we wouldn't have been talking this much about it if India would have scored anywhere near 250 in the first innings(which was possible IMO).

Ehhh I think people were plenty concerned about the pitch after Joe Root, who is a part-timer - a very good, competent part-timer, but still - was bowling hand grenades and got 5/****-all.

 

[Kirkut]

Nah . 90s always had pitches like this.
Both team are very poor players of spin.

Would want to believe in that. Did you watch Root's bowling? Crazy stuff

 

[Daemon]

That's bull****, Ashwin getting the Kamaal Ka Moment (Magic Moment) award to trap his 400th victim.

Should've gone to Ishant for his six.