England won’t be scared of ‘dangerous’ India pitches

Rohit Sharma’s comments on the Cape Town pitch following the shortest-ever completed Test match this week gave England fair warning to expect five tricky surfaces when they travel to India this month.

Ben Stokes’ Bazballers were already under no illusions about what to expect during their five-match series that starts in Hyderabad on 25 January, with four spinners selected in their squad in anticipation of pitches that will turn square from ball one.

Yet Rohit’s words after the 642-ball, seven-wicket victory over South Africa – which ended with his team chasing down 79 shortly after lunch on day two – felt like a clarion call to India’s groundsmen to amp up their plans for England’s visit.

“I honestly don’t mind playing on pitches like this,” said India’s captain. “As long as everyone keeps their mouth shut in India and don’t talk too much about Indian pitches, honestly.

“Yes, it is dangerous. It is challenging. That’s what happens in India, but, in India on day one, if the pitch starts turning, people start talking about ‘puff of dust! puff of dust!’”

Accusing the International Cricket Council’s match referees of double standards when it comes to marking pitches, Rohit made clear the widely held view in India that those from outside Asia are hypocritical when it comes to juicing up surfaces to accentuate home advantage.

The fact is, though, nobody does it like India, who often juice up spinning conditions to such levels that it warps the contest.

While seam dominated in Cape Town rather than spin, the contest was eerily reminiscent of England’s two-day mauling by India on a dog of a pitch in Ahmedabad in early 2021, a match that lasted 842 balls, saw no team score more than 145 and Joe Root take a career-best five for eight with his occasional off-spin.

After being hammered by 227 runs in the opening Test at Chennai on a pitch that most agreed offered a decent balance between bat and ball, the Indian board sacked the groundsman and ordered rank turners for the three remaining Tests, all of which the hosts won easily, with their spinners taking 54 of the 60 English wickets available.

As seen in Cape Town this week, uber-dicey pitches can occur anywhere. But if we’re to believe South Africa Test coach Shukri Conrad, the sub-par surface at Newlands was down more to an inexperienced groundsman preparing his first Test pitch rather than attempting to tilt conditions in the home side’s favour.

Indeed, Conrad’s view of the pitch contrasted starkly to that of Rohit. “It’s a sad state when you need more luck than skill to survive in a Test match,” he said. “All the ethics and values of Test cricket go out the window. This was just a slug-fest, a slogathon and [about] whoever was luckier.”

Cape Town may have panned out differently had the hosts bowled first. Instead they chose to bat after winning the toss and were bowled out for 55 in their first innings. Really, though, as excellent as India were, the match was a complete lottery.

Yet a series of lotteries ­– or slogathons – would actually suit England in India if that’s the way the hosts go regarding the pitches. Horse-racing-mad coach Brendon McCullum famously likes a punt and he will fancy his team’s chances in such conditions.

England will bat aggressively come what may and dicey pitches will eliminate the team’s biggest weakness – the inability to consistently take 20 wickets on Indian pitches.

India boast a far superior bowling attack, especially in the spin department, with England picking two uncapped slow bowlers in Tom Hartley and Shoaib Bashir and another in teenager Rehan Ahmed who has played just one Test.

Jack Leach is the only senior spinner in the squad. They will be outgunned if conditions are becalmed. But they will come into the contests if they are extreme.

Aidan Markram, who scored a superb 106 from 103 balls in South Africa’s second innings in Cape Town showed the way with the bat for the Bazballers, shrugging off inevitable plays and misses as the ball moved all over the place. “You have to remain as positive as you can be, always look to score, and if the odd one goes past your edge, just laugh it off,” he said. “You just wing it while you are out there.”

It’s an approach straight from the Bazball playbook and one England will embrace in the coming weeks. It should also act as a warning to India that over-egging their pitch calculations for the coming series could come back to bite them.