Who defines what a good surface is? Ashwin lashes out at pitch critics

On Thursday, with a thumping ten-wicket win over England in the only Day-Night Test match of the series, Team India made a remarkable comeback in the series and took an unbeaten lead of 2-1 in the ongoing four-match Test series.

Mumbai:It has been two days, almost as much time as India needed to win the third Test but the raging controversy around the Motera Pitch is still making headlines.

On Thursday, with a thumping ten-wicket win over England in the only Day-Night Test match of the series, Team India made a remarkable comeback in the series and took an unbeaten lead of 2-1 in the ongoing four-match Test series.

However, more than India's turn around in the series, much like the 2nd Test in Chennai, it has been the Motera pitch that hogged the limelight. And India's spin wizard Ravichandran Ashwin is not happy about these "agenda-driven" views of the pitch. When asked whether Motera Pitch was a good surface for Test cricket, a frustrated Ashwin, who touched the landmark of 400 Test wickets in just 77 games during the short match, hit back: “I have a question back. What is a good cricket surface? Who defines it?”

The Ace Indian spinner also did not mince his words when he was asked if it was a good contest between bat and ball, saying that, “Yes, of course. The bowler was in the game. The batsman needs to bat well to get runs. There is absolutely no question about it. What makes a good surface? Who defines this? Seam on the first day, then bat well, then spin on the last two days. C’mon! Who makes all these rules? We need to get over it, and not talk about whatever picture we want to paint.

“If you’re asking whether it’s a good Test surface, I don’t see any of the players from England having an issue with the surface. They want to improve. They look like they want to have a contest. Is it the players and the people who are reporting that want their players to complain about the pitches? Because we’ve never done that on any of the tours,” the veteran of 77 Test matches said.

Ashwin also gave a very diplomatic answer, when asked if he would want a similar surface for the next Test?

“It depends on what you’re hoping for. We’re hoping for a good cricket match. That’s that you should be hoping for, not (hoping) about the surface,” Ashwin said.

The 34-year-old further stressed that every Day-Night Test match have ended in just three days.

“There’ve been some people who’ve messaged me and said, ‘the match finished in two days!’ What about all the three pink-ball Test matches that we’ve played? Everything has ended in a three-day time. When somebody just throws an opinion out there about a surface and having played the game, unfortunately, they may not have played pink-ball Tests, so they do not understand this facet of the game."

“My angst against the whole thing is the fact that when people say something there are so many of them who are watching the same picture but are not able to paint a different one compared to somebody who is driving and selling a certain case to us. This needs to stop,” Ashwin said.

When Ashwin was quizzed if it was veteran Indian all-rounder Yuvraj Singh's remark on Kumble and Harbhajan getting 1000 and 800 wickets respectively, have they played in such conditions, instigated him to post some cryptic tweets. He said, “The reason behind my tweets were definitely not in context to anybody in particular. When I read Yuvi pa’s tweet, I didn’t get affected because I didn’t find that he was telling us anything, trying to suggest anything. I didn’t find it anything wrong or agenda-driven. I have known ‘Yuvi pa’ for a long time and I have the utmost respect for him."

“With respect to your agendadriven thoughts, this is exactly what my tweets were about,” he said.