The pitch at the historic Lord’s Cricket Ground, known as the Home of Cricket, came under heavy criticism during the ongoing Test match between England and New Zealand.
With a total of 33 wickets falling in the first two days of the match, unbalanced bounce and the ball being unusually low at times, former cricketers have raised questions about the quality of the pitch and there are also fears that the wicket could face ICC scrutiny.
England batsman Jacob Bethell was dismissed by a similar ball from Kiwi fast bowler Matt Henry that was much lower than expected, which was also commented on by commentators.
Former Australian women’s cricketer said that you can’t do anything with such a ball. This pitch will trouble New Zealand in the fourth innings.
On the other hand, former English bowler Stuart Broad said that Jacob Bethell could not do anything with this ball, it kept rolling on the floor, while Michael Atherton said that the bounce of the pitch lacked consistency, so the chances of LBW increased.
Michael Atherton added that I do not think it is a good pitch, the MCC has to admit that there is something wrong with the Lord’s square, last year the Test match between England and India was good but the pitch was not good.
Former captain Nasir Hussain said that the middle part of the Lord’s ground is not very good, an attempt has been made to improve it, the pitch lacks pace, the bounce is uneven and the seam happens when there are clouds, the quality of bowling is impossible to bat on such a pitch, there is nothing worse for the batsmen than uneven bounce.
Match situation
Looking at the match situation, 16 wickets fell on the first day and 17 on the second day. England scored 140 runs in the first innings, in response to which the Kiwi team scored 113 runs in their first innings and lost by 27 runs.
In the second innings, the host team scored 226 runs with a lead of 27 runs and thus New Zealand got a target of 254 runs to win. Today, on the third day of play, New Zealand needs 218 runs to win and has scored 36 runs for 3 wickets and needs another 182 runs to win.