The WACA pitch

Well, the pitch didn't play as badly as I had feared (maybe because the bowlers didn't hit the cracks enough, thank goodness for that) but it didn't look pretty, did it? I'm all for bowler friendly surfaces but you don't really want to see such pitches at club level, let alone at international level. It was not even a substandard pitch. The pitch nearly split into two halves. I was literally quaking in my boots watching this from the television, so you can imagine how this must have been for the batsmen. Stokes' herculean effort doesn't take anything away from the fact that this was an awful pitch and I'm pretty disappointed that it hasn't been reported yet.

those were superficial cracks. A team doesn't score 350 on the fourth innings into the penultimate session on a substandard deck, ever.

As I said, the bowlers didn't hit the cracks enough. Doesn't change the fact that the pitch very nearly split into two halves.

A few years ago, I was a bit of an illusionist. It wasnt serious, or anything, just something I did to impress the girls before my biceps grew. One of my best tricks was to guess the color of every card in the deck (red or white). I would get every single card in the deck wrong. Why? Because its a lot harder to get every single card wrong than the opposite (unless there are mirrors or reflections involved - which I used).

The point of my little anecdote is that it's a lot harder to get every ball in an "obviously substandard" pitch to behave than it is to achieve the opposite. It simply isnt possible to bowl so many good balls on that pitch unless the cracks, much like the trick, are just superficial

Well that was the last Test match there for a while. No test fixture has been scheduled there next year for the touring Indians.

The new development across the river won't be ready until 2018. It will be a multi-purpose arena. Looks like a smaller version of Soccer City to me. It will be sad to see the WACA out of use (given it's famous history) but the facilities are primitive compared to our other cricket grounds.

https://www.google.com.au/search?q=new+perth+stadium&client=firefox-a&hs=5rj&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&channel=fflb&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=Dc2wUp2jGaijigfn-ICQDw&ved=0CAkQ_AUoAQ&biw=1280&bih=648

Linebreaker wrote:Well that was the last Test match there for a while. No test fixture there next year for the touring Indians.

The new development across the river won't be ready until 2018. That will be a multi-purpose arena. Looks like a smaller version of Soccer City to me. It will be sad to see the WACA out of use (given it's famous history) but the facilities are primitive compared to our other cricket grounds.

https://www.google.com.au/search?q=new+perth+stadium&client=firefox-a&hs=5rj&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&channel=fflb&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=Dc2wUp2jGaijigfn-ICQDw&ved=0CAkQ_AUoAQ&biw=1280&bih=648

It will be very sad if it disappears from test cricket though. The pitch, I would say, is renowned as the best in the world guaranteeing exciting cricket with plenty of runs on offer as well as pace and bounce for the bowlers. This new multi-purpose arena sounds like it will have no character and of course it will have no history/legacy with cricket and that wonderful pitch at the WACA will be lost to cricket.   

I suppose if a consortium of Aussies, ex-pat Saffas and Poms could get some financial deal together (probably with a good dollop of Indian or Chinese money... and throw in a few apartment buildings nearby... like they were trying to do recently) then it could be turned into something very nice for the spectators, media and players.