DHARAMSHALA: India coach Rahul Dravid has strongly objected to the International Cricket Council‘s (ICC) decision to rate the pitches for the India-Pakistan game in Ahmedabad on Oct 14 and the India-Australia game in Chennai on Oct 8 as ‘average’.
Dravid said here on Saturday that giving ‘good’ ratings only to standardised pitches which produce runs will rob the game of vital and unique skill sets. “I will definitely respectfully disagree with the average rating given for those two wickets. I think they were good wickets,” Dravid said, “If you only want to see 350-plus games and rate only those wickets as good, then I disagree with that.”I think you have to see different skills on display as well. If we wanted to see only fours and sixes being hit, then we have T20 wickets as well… in Delhi or in Pune, probably 350-plus wickets. If only those are good wickets, then why are the bowlers here? Why have spinners at all… if one ball spins or two balls spin and you rate that as average?”
TOI had exclusively reported the ICC ratings for the pitches, with tracks at only these two venues being rated ‘average’. In Ahmedabad, India won by 7 wickets, chasing down the 192-run target in 30.3 overs. In Chennai, India won by 6 wickets after restricting Australia to 199 on a spin-friendly pitch. “We should see all skills on display, the ability to rotate strike through the middle. See the quality of watching Jadeja bowl or a Santner or a Zampa, or watch Kane Williamson rotate the strike through the middle… Virat and Rahul, the way they batted against Australia. Those are skills as well. Those also need to be shown and be displayed.
“On some of the wickets we have played, like in Delhi and Pune, rotating the strike in the middle overs wasn’t necessarily a very difficult skill. The contest was about who could hit more fours and sixes. So that’s not the only way, in my opinion, to be able to judge wickets.
“We need to have a better way of deciding what is good and average. I don’t know what the rating was for those wickets, but (when) we played the T20 World Cup in Australia, in Perth… it was seaming and swinging all over the place. That’s a T20 game. I don’t know what rating was given to that,” Dravid said, adding, “Sometimes wickets will turn a bit, sometimes they will seam, they will swing a bit, they will bounce a bit. (If) all we want to see is sixes and fours being hit and (rate) 350 scores as good wickets, I disagree.”