EXCLUSIVE: Pitches at Motera, Chennai are like fields to grow vegetables, says Karsan Ghavri

Legendary left-handed pace bowler Karsan Ghavri views on Team India's brilliant performance may not go down well with many Indian cricket aficionados... He dismissed the pitches at Motera and Chennai as unfit for cricket.

Hyderabad: Legendary left-handed pace bowler Karsan Ghavri, who alongside Kapil Dev plucked 183 wickets in 27 Test matches, feels the wicket at Motera and Chennai are like "fields to grow vegetables" and he has never been witnessed to such strips in his entire cricket career.

In an exclusive interview with ETV Bharat, Ghavri talks about Motera and Chennai pitches, and England team's misjudgement of the 22 yards in the last Test match at Narendra Modi Stadium.

Excerpts:

Q. Do you think the wicket at Motera and Chennai was unfair on England?

A. I feel it's unfair to play on such a wicket because our Indian cricket lovers and people who watch the game in stadium and television view cricket as an entertainment and our players' job is to entertain. If a five-day game is ending in just two days, it kills the game. An ideal pitch should be good for both batters and bowlers in the first two days and as the time progresses, it is bound to get deteriorated. The bowl should start turning from third day onwards and not like what it was in Chennai and Ahmedabad. They were like agricultural fields. It was very difficult for batsman to score runs and survive. It is quite unfair for both the teams.

Q. Most of the former and current Indian cricketers have defended the pitch reasoning that they too got green tops when they went overseas...

A. You must have noticed, pitches were seaming in Australia series. But the match didn't end within three days. A match should go on till the fifth day. In SENA countries, they may give you bouncy, greenish track on the first day, which helps the fast bowlers but as the game goes on, it is bound to slow down because they cut grass everyday on the pitch. There was no question about grass here. There were none on the first day itself. India is creating a bad picture of our cricket.

Q. There always was a puff of dust coming off the wicket when the ball landed on the pitch.

A. It was not a cricket pitch. It was like a field to grow vegetables.

Q. Did you ever witness this kind of a wicket ever in your playing days?

A. Never.

Q. Do you think India went for rank turners out of desperation after losing the first Test?

A. BCCI and the Indian team management, in the back of their minds, knew that they had to qualify for the World Test Championship. They knew the Indian team had to beat England 3-1, 2-1 to play against New Zealand in the finals. All this must have crossed their minds and probably the reason why they went for turners to win the Test matches and qualify for the World Championship. The wicket was same for both the teams but we survived due to a lead in the first innings. What if England had scored 250 in the first innings? We might have struggled.

Q. Under the circumstances, would you like to give credit to Indian batsmen?

A. It was difficult to score on that pitch. On such wickets, the best way to play is to attack. In the second innings, while chasing a target of 35-40 runs (49 runs), the way Rohit Sharma and Shubhman Gill played and got runs were through attack. It wasn't the case that they got runs through singles and doubles. They were all fours and sixes. Unfortunately for England, it was a very bad selection as they never included any spinner except one left-arm spinner -- Jack Leach. Imagine Joe Root taking five wickets who is not a regular.

Q. How did this blunder happen?

A. Before the beginning of play, the coach and manager go and see the wicket. They have a fair idea how the pitch is going to behave. If you see grass on the wicket, you know you have to play seamers. If you don't see any grass, you get the idea to bring in spinners. It was a case of misreading or misjudgement by the England team.

Q. Darren Gough recently said that the Indian cricket team is like the Australia of 90s. Your comments.

A. It's will be a completely different scenario if we play the same England team in their own den. But here, they are finding very difficult to negotiate with the spin. Wickets definitely had a role to play.

- Ayushmaan Pandey