The ground reality of Indian cricket - stadiums and numbers

The India-Australia series last year showed how pathetic the situation is for bowlers in India

Something quite peculiar happened on 13th November 2003. India were playing Pakistan at Eden Gardens in a one off limited overs contest to celebrate 75 years of the BCCI.

Batting first, India scored an imperious 292 in their allotted overs. A total in excess of 200 had not been chased successfully at the ground in over twelve years. Eden Gardens pitch was known to deteriorate rapidly in the second innings, as India quite famously found out in the semi finals of the ’96 World Cup. A total in excess of 200 had been chased successfully only 4 times in the previous 14 occasions. To make it stiffer, a total in excess of 250 had been chased just once!

Engulfed by that famous Calcutta smog, Pakistan coolly chased down 293 and won the game on a canter, with an over to spare. That match set me thinking about the pitch in that hallowed turf of Eden gardens.

This was the same turf on which Tendulkar magically saved India the blushes by bowling an impeccable final over against South Africa in the Hero Cup semi final in 1993. A few days later in the finals, Anil Kumble ran through the West Indies lineup and ended up with outrageous figures of 6/12, which at that time were the third best figures in limited overs cricket.

Since that day, 20 matches have been played and 8 hundreds scored and totals in excess of 250 have been set and chased with consummate ease. In the 17 matches before that day, a mere 4 hundreds were scored. Eden Gardens slowly started shifting from being one of the best One Day venues, and suddenly started going mainstream. So what went wrong?

As Indians, we like to fuss over our pitches. In an era when scores in excess of 300 are being chased down with alarming regularity and when the fielding restrictions are being turned against the bowlers, the pitches deserve some scrutiny from us.

The India-Australia series last year was in the news for a lot of reasons. I conducted a small study in contrast between two series, India v Australia in India and Pakistan v South Africa in the UAE.

The two series make for some astounding stats:

• In the five matches that reached their conclusion in India, the top 6 batsmen from both teams amassed an eye popping 2725 runs at 55 per wicket. A hop, skip and a jump across the Arabian Sea in the UAE, the top 6 Pakistani and South African batsmen were able to score a mere 1556 runs at a paltry 26 per wicket.
• The Indian series saw 7 hundreds, one double hundred, 13 fifties, 287 fours and 76 sixes from the top six batsmen. The UAE series, on the other hand, saw just 2 hundreds, 7 fifties, less than 150 fours and a mere 13 sixes.
• The 8 hundreds recorded in the India-Aus series were the most ever in any bilateral series.
• The batting averages are also the highest for any bilateral series featuring five or more matches. So was the strike rate.
• The bowlers were unfortunately whacked all over the place and a total in excess of three hundred was conceded in nine of the ten innings!
• The bowling average stood at 54, which was the worst for any bilateral series. The economy rate of the bowlers too was an incredible 6.5.
• There were no five wicket hauls in the Ind-Aus series. There was just 1 four wicket haul. In the UAE, there were 3 four wickets hauls and 1 five-for.

God knows what else might’ve happened if those two games at Cuttack and Ranchi had not been washed out.

All this points to a greater malaise. We surely have to point fingers at the kind of wickets that are being prepared in this country because the very same bowling Aussie attack tore England to shreds Down Under. There is no denying the fact that low scoring matches do make for exceptionally good viewing. The occasional high scoring game does add a bit to the flavour. But an overdose of either high scoring or low scoring games kills the joy.

The general argument made on TV is that a batsman’s skillset can be viewed in all its glory on a spiteful wicket where run making is difficult. But should the same logic be applied to bowlers by saying that the bowler must show us how good he is on a batting friendly wicket. I somehow do not conform to that view. Let me justify why. I shall speak purely with limited overs cricket in mind.

Gone are the days when the MCG would have boundaries that were longer than 100m. So a batsman had to be exceptionally well built to hit it out of the playing area. Post renovation, the boundaries were brought in and all run fours have become all but extinct. In India, boundaries rarely stretch beyond eighty meters. That, combined with the nasty fielding restrictions and dreadful wickets are conspiring to make limited overs cricket a sad affair for the bowlers.

A deeper analysis of the stats gives us a clear picture of all that is wrong with Indian wickets. Post the 2011 World Cup, batsmen average the highest when playing in India (at 34.77 per wicket). Indian crowds have witnessed more centuries, fifties, fours and sixes than crowds in any other cricket watching nation. Bowling averages in India are the highest (at nearly 39 per wicket) when compared with other countries that have hosted a minimum of ten matches since the World Cup. Poor chaps have picked just 1 five wicket haul in nearly three years.

But one might ask, what really is the fuss about? India are still second from the top (They just lost their top rank after yet another loss to New Zealand). But a deeper foray into the statistical jungle threw up something rather absurd. In simple words, India is still in the top two because they’ve played a disproportionately large number of matches on home soil and against poor oppositions. When pitted against a decent opposition in favourable conditions (Read home conditions), they’ve just about managed to hold their fort in the limited overs version.

Here’s the story.

The great divide – home and away

Flat tracks have pampered the Indian batsmen, and made them ill-prepared for the challenges overseas

Since the World Cup, India have played 73 limited overs matches. They average about 35 in those games. In home games, they average nearly 40. In away games though, the average drops down to about 30, which incidentally is the greatest drop for any Test playing nation!

But hidden in those 73 matches is a small loophole that is rarely seen. India played 22 matches against West Indies (16), Zimbabwe (5) and Bangladesh (1) which, not surprisingly, is the most played by any country. So this means, that about 30% of India’s matches have been played against sides whose bowling quality is most certainly suspect. Let’s see what happens when we take out these games.

In matches not featuring West Indies, Zimbabwe or Bangladesh, India’s batsmen average about 27 away from home and a shade above 39 at home. So the drop now comes to about 12 points. They may still be the best batting team in home conditions, but away from home, they are just marginally better farers than Bangladesh, West Indies and Zimbabwe, which is a real shame.

So my contention is that, the number one ranking in one day cricket has been built on a very shaky ground. Mind you, my tirade is at no point directed at the players because they are merely vassals of the invincible, unconquerable lord. I’m merely pointing out the fallacy of the argument that India is the number one side in the world.

The same pattern is replicated in their first class performances.

But that begs the question, why is there such disparity in performances even now? After all, India play the most number limited overs matches. By now and by all logic, they should’ve been invincible. India now have a fairly settled side in Tests as well and yet they are unable to win anything worth mentioning.

Indian grounds – a batsman’s dream, a bowler’s nightmare

The results at home have been completely one-sided

A look at some interesting numbers pertaining to Test venues may just point out the problem to us. Since the 2003 World Cup, a lot of water has flown under the bridge called Indian cricket and so it is a safe reference point for us. I’ve kept just one criterion for the stadia to satisfy. For this analysis, the stadium must’ve hosted at least 4 Tests in the given period to qualify.

The list consisted of 51 stadia that have hosted at least 4 Test matches since 2003.

To my surprise, there are 3 Indian grounds in the top ten when grounds are arranged in order of their batting averages. These stadia are: Eden Gardens, Chepauk and Motera.

It would be helpful and worth our time spent watching cricket at these venues if they were also at least in the top 20 in terms of bowling averages. But unfortunately, on a list of 51 grounds, all the above mentioned grounds come in the final ten with bowling averages hovering around 40.

Of the 18 matches that India played at these venues, 10 produced results and seven were drawn. Featuring in the top 10 in the batting averages and in the bottom 10 in the bowling averages tells me that these grounds provide good surfaces for just one aspect of cricket, which is batting. High batting and bowling averages rarely produce good cricket.

Another interesting feature of the victories (For India or for their opponents) at these venues was the margin, which was never less than:

• 195 runs or
• innings and 15 runs or
• 6 wickets

All this points to some seriously attritional and dull cricket.

Pre-2003: Before the mayhem

Let us now compare the stats for Indian grounds for the period i.e. from 1995-2003.

One might find it very interesting when I say that there was just 1 Indian ground in the top 10 viz. Eden Gardens. And equally interestingly, Eden Gardens is the only Indian ground in the last 10 in bowling averages. There were 13 matches played at the above mentioned venues. Nine of them produced results. The margin of victories also tells us a tale:

• Ind v Aus at Chepauk- India won by 2 wickets.
• Ind v Pak at Chepauk- Pakistan won by 12 runs.
• Ind v Pak at Eden- Pakistan won by 46 runs.
• Ind v South Africa at Ahmedabad- India won by 64 runs.

All this simply tells us a tale of deteriorating standards of Indian wickets. And our batsmen unfortunately have become extremely used to playing on such placid pitches. Not just our batsmen, but our bowlers too are plagued by the same problems of not getting any assistance from the tracks.

One simply has to look back at heydays of Test cricket to understand what a Test cricket wicket was. These lively wickets produced some of the most memorable cricket at least in terms of skill. The wickets deteriorated and the games usually hurtled towards their conclusion on the final days and all that provided some edge of the seat stuff. In layman’s words, the standard of the pitches is dropping in India and that’s about it.

The inevitable drop in standards

This current setup may be able to sustain and produce decent batsmen for a few more years. But soon after, my prediction is that we will go the West Indies way if things don’t improve soon. Isn’t that a bit too harsh, one might argue. But let’s simplify things for a moment. To produce decent batsmen, you need good bowlers and good wickets. Indian domestic bowling is already quite substandard with all those poor pitches and increasingly greater focus on shorter gains like the IPL.

We are already witnessing a sea of change in the bowling department with India being left with a bowling unit which is statistically the worst performing one in the world. They’ve been quite poor even away from home, so that settles the question about unhelpful conditions. Such is the quality that the unit is unable to utilize conditions even when they are helpful. So my proposition is that with such poor bowlers, you will never produce batsmen of Test quality which is paramount.

A decade and a half ago, Sachin and Azhar single handedly tore Warne apart in one afternoon at Chepauk on a rank turner. A year or so ago, India succumbed to Swann and Panesar on a rank turner at Mumbai without a fight. In the next test, they failed to read Anderson’s reverse swing when they had arguably the best exponent of the craft in Zaheer on their side. In both those tests, rank turners had been requested by the Indian staff. Hard to believe isn’t it?

Another problem is that with the administrators itself. One simple tournament like the Kanga League made Mumbai’s batsmen what they were, near invincible. The tournament was played in the height of the rainy season when the mud hit the batsman’s face before the ball did. A thirty in the Kanga League was worth its weight in gold because the ball would seam and swing prodigiously. A good batsman in the Kanga League was certainly a good batsman in other conditions. The administrators have now killed the tournament by rescheduling it in the non-rainy months.

The game has survived endless such assaults. It has seen and lost wily young cricketers to the two world wars and still come out unscathed. No sport mirrors the ups and downs of life like cricket and that’s probably what endears it to us. Someone may tell me that the future for the sport is very bleak due to haggling in the ICC between the superpowers of the game.

But I’m an eternal optimist and I will believe unto my dying breath that this land will throw up another Sachin. That one fine day, the followers of this great game in this wonderful land will have their lust for a Wasim or a Waqar or an Ambrose or a Holding satiated. That all will be well again with the game we love.