We were all looking forward to a good day’s cricket on 27th Dec morning – the final one dayer between Sri Lanka and India at the Firoz shah kotla ground at Delhi . What we witnessed during the first one hour was sheer horror -wildly swinging and rising ball , injured batsman and even the fast bowlers looking surprised at the behaviour of the ball. Initially,we thought it was the cold weather and frost doing the trick but soon a chance comment from Sunil Gavaskar pointed to the unplayable pitch . Soon, all hell broke out and the Match Referee abandoned the game . The full house crowd on a Sunday morning cursed everyone from the Delhi Cricket Association to BCCI and all those responsible for this shameful act or omission. A great let down indeed bringing avoidable national shame.
Every cricketing country prepares pitches to suit the home team which is generally well understood by all. But, not preparing a pitch for a limited over match to minimum safety standards is never heard of . There is a very elaborate back room operation in the shape of curators, pitch committee etc to oversee such arrangements to avoid any lapses as the stakes at such an international event are quite high. Therefore, a thorough investigation is called for to find the causes and fix the blame . The weak link in the process needs to be identified and corrected to avoid such instances in future. This incident has come at a time when Delhi’s ability and capability to host and stage the Commonwealth Games is already being doubted. Yet another question raised is did some one like Gavaskar had to bring it out during the match or could it have been found out by the umpires or team captains well in time before the commencement of the match? All said and done, let us hope it was a solitary lapse and NOT a system failure by a nation who breathe cricket every day to the permanent smile and great assets of all stake holders.After all, there is BIG Money in Cricket!!
Thank you.