Since Australia’s capitulation in the second Test at Lord’s, the spotlight has been shone not only on those responsible for Australia’s deplorable batting, but on the system that appears to be producing fewer and fewer Test-standard players.
I’m referring to the time-honoured Sheffield Shield.
The finger of blame has been pointed to the number of “result wickets” being prepared across the country as responsible for the dearth of heavy run scorers over the past six seasons as well as Australia’s frailties against quality spin.
Pat Howard mooted the idea of five day Shield fixtures in the coming seasons, presumably to encourage more spin bowling and therefore expose our up-and-coming players to conditions they may be unfamiliar with.
The idea has merit but for the game to last into the fifth day, both sides must possess the quality batsmen in the top order they evidently do not have.
Theoretically, Australia’s young batsmen should be given the best apprenticeship they could ask for given this apparent abundance of bowlers’ wickets and the quality bowlers most shield sides have in their attack at the moment.
New South Wales may well field an attack that contains any or all of Hazlewood, Cummins, Sandhu, Starc, Copeland and Lyon at some point this summer while Victoria could potentially wheel out McKay, Pattinson, Siddle and Ahmed.
Tasmania’s attack looks as strong as ever with Bird, Butterworth and Faulkner forming the backbone. Queensland have a good crop of youngsters as well as Ryan Harris while Chadd Sayers, Kane Richardson and Gary Putland are developing into fine fast bowlers in South Australia.
Burt Cockley and Ryan Duffield, both fit and firing, have set tongues wagging in Western Australia, not to mention two of Australia’s most hyped young cricketers Mitchell Marsh and Ashton Agar.
So, with all this bowling talent around to develop against, why are our Test batsmen struggling on the bowler-friendly, but largely timid, English pitches?
Is it a lack of “tough runs?”
Is it the relatively “easy” pathway into first class cricket for our youngsters?
Is it the great evil of our time, T20 cricket?
Maybe it is all three, maybe it is none of them.
Test cricket should be a test of a player’s ability, their patience, their discipline and the desire to win.
Sadly, the Australian team is failing each of these tests, largely because the six or seven batsmen each Shield team puts on the park each game are too.
Justin Langer began his tenure as coach of Western Australia with the phrase “I’ll pick character over cut shots every time.”
This is a huge step forward for Western Australian cricket who have been propping up the table for longer than they haven’t been over the past decade due to ill discipline and a culture of ego.
Langer, a man who made his Test debut against the might of the Windies, was dropped more times than “the beat” on the latest Ministry of Sound album in the early part of his Test career and who shed blood playing for his country, but wished he could have shed more, is the perfect man for the job in Western Australia, and also the perfect role model for our aspiring Test batsmen of all ages.
Langer loved his reputation as grinder, a grafter, a scorer of “tough runs” because that’s what he knew it took to succeed at Test cricket and to be called those things meant he was a successful Test player.
If you look across the country, there are a few batsmen who are capable of being successful Test players, but for one reason or another are yet to cement their opportunity or stake their claim through weight of runs for an extended period of time.
Laziness, rash shots, a lack of discipline and injury have all prevented George Bailey, Mark Cosgrove, Shaun Marsh, Phil Hughes and Callum Ferguson, to name a few, from being successful Test players so far.
It is upto batsmen like them and those around a similar age group to apply pressure on those in the Test team to maintain their spots through weight of runs and consistent performance.
In years gone by, Langer would look at the Gabba deck greener than Bruce Banner after a bottle of angry pills, look up at Andy Bichel at the top of his mark and think “this is going to be fun”. It is up to our current crop of batsmen to adopt the same attitude.
The six groundsmen around Australia need to keep the pitches green to maximise the challenge for our future Test batsmen and breed a culture of “challenging cricket” in the Shield over the coming years.
With the fast bowling depth across the country, there’s never been a better time to encourage an appetite for the contest across our latest crop of first class cricketers.
Lancey5times
Guest
The Sydney wicket is a greater tragedy in my opinion
Rellum
Roar Guru
Love the over reaction to this. There was a few green tops in Tassie and one or two extra green looking wickets at the MCG, but apart from that the wickets where not green tops. Maybe the batsmen around the country should focus on getting runs on difficult wickets instead of trying to manipulate the debate for their own purposes. That said I also agree that at shield level we need to go back to the variety of wickets that we used to have. I have been arguing this for a long time now on this site and I am glad people are starting to come around to agreeing it is the way to go. Things run deeper than just the type of decks we see in shield cricket though. From what I have read grade cricket is now much weaker than when I played. Some one describing current 1st graders as 3rd grade standard from 20 years ago. This is a serious issue. Add that to junior cricket converted to 20/20 or limited batting time( I don't mind games of limited batting time for some competitions, but there should be two day games also available for 12 years and above.) and we have lost a development path that was the envy of the cricket world. Yes we are on a downward turn in the talent cycle but we should not be this low. Centres of Excellence have removed players from the harsh grounding they would have received in grade then shield. Being pampered then thrown into 1st class cricket you are on a hiding to nothing. We have to rethink the entire pathway and structure of the game in this country.
Pete
Guest
I have a better solution - play 1st class games against NZ sides. Possibly look at having a combined competition. NZ pitches are the closest in the world to English ones, so this would be extremely beneficial to Australia.
Hookin' YT
Guest
How good is that!
Don Corleone
Guest
Well, I live on a farm these days and have devoted a paddock to a half-size ground, rolled clay pitch with a synthetic grass mat and picket fence boundary........great for my kids........but more likely making up for my lost childhood.
Hookin' YT
Guest
When I go to a nieces or nephew for the first time and they are skiting about how nice the house is yadayada all I ascertain is pitch availabilty for kids.
Hookin' YT
Guest
Lunchtimes and recesses at school were an endless cricket match. Balls on the roof and over the school fence were out so we played on the deck.
Don Corleone
Guest
I grew up in the city, had a tiny narrow backyard but managed to squeeze in a 3/4 length pitch. Found some old matting on a council clean-up pile and stretched it over the concrete patio at the batting end. I'd play cricket from 9am to 9pm, only breaking for lunch and dinner...absolutely no sunscreen.
Hookin' YT
Guest
Older folk, remember when we played backyard cricket? Club practice twice a week, school cricket and backyard cricket other days. The backyards are so tiny and dads getting home late has killed backyard and school cricket in public schools is a fraction of what it was. You rarely see kids playing street cricket and most are engrossed playing COD on PS3. Its dieing.
Timmuh
Roar Guru
As others have said, green tops everywhere is not a good thing. Its really only been the vase for 2-3 years though, so hardly having an effect on mid-career players. The green tops are a two-edged thing. Firstly, they may play a part in over-estimating the bowling stocks. With the bat they can wor either way. Some players might tighten their techniques and learn to battle through tough times, this clearly is a good thing. Others, however (and this seems more common), may feel they will get out anyway so they may as well hit out in the meantime. Then again, producing roads doesn't test batsmen properly either and can lead to bowlers becoming overly defensive. A mix of different surfaces around the nation is ideal, and as we saw at Bellerive this summer a green top early in the season does not necessarily remain so by season's end. Bellerive still had life in it at the end of the sason, but wasn't the seamer's dream it seemed to be in the first half. There are deeper issues at Shield level and below. Firstly, over the last 10-20 years we have seen few Shield games where the Test players take part. That does seem to have helped reduce the quality of the Shield. Admittedly in that time Australia also had a long period at the very top of the game, but many of those players started when it was more common to see Test players playing for their states. Is the Shield points structure an issue? All out attack is great for a dominant team, and encouraged by the points system where there is basically no difference between a loss and a draw - at least when put against four of five opponents. The system rewards trying to chase a win from impossible situations, whereas in a Test a draw would be the goal from that point. Does this help produce players who can't play out time? Again, is this a flaw that was hidden by having a superteam at Test lavel where attacking play at all times would rewarded more often than not. The rise of development squads and the like has also taken the near-Shield player out of club cricket and arguably weakened the most basic pillar Australian cricket has rested on, particularly in Sydney and Melbourne, for over a century. The BBL possibly will add to this even more, by taking more players out of the third tier for longer. At junior levels there are, in some states at least, limitations on the number of balls a player can face before retiring. This encourages mass participation, but also encourages the gifted players to simply go slap happy and maximise their runs in the knowledge they won't get out. Young players are not being taught how to defence, much less the value of that capability. This is a T20-type mentality, but pre-dates the rise of T20 considerably. Mass participation at junior level is needed, but neds to be balanced somehow with teaching the basics. Technical flaws are harder to fix when a player is older and the bad habits have become ingrained, when the pressure goes on players revert to type which means an issue not fixed but merely patched.
rawiller
Guest
drop ins suck ...hope perth holds out ...and the gabba too ...one of our best wickets...they have got too Adelaide ...hope they haven't ruined cricket at one of the worlds best grounds
TheSilentProgressor
Guest
This is the most simple and clear solution. Like others have said have pitches that on the first day are very good for the bowlers with the ball moving around a bit, so that the top-order batsmen really have to fight for their runs. Once they navigate the first session the pitch starts to flatten out a bit and the batsmen can start to look to score more freely. Additionally the faster bowlers in the first session could look to seam and swing the ball before they have to adopt a more consistent line and length to frustrate the batsmen. Then on the last few days the pitches should start to spin a bit. Clearly there is a need for variety in the pitches that are served up at shield level and it would be great to see some of the older pitches coming back. The Green Top is Tassy, The Bouncing WACCA, and the Turning SCG.
Gr8rWeStr
Guest
Well put Chris. Its the even contest that rewards the most patient player that produces the best Test cricketers. The County Cricket scoring system seems to reward both sides for remaining in the contest and pushing for the win, so I'd like to see a similar scoring system introduced for the Sheffield Shield.
Michael
Guest
We used to have a variety of cricket wickets around the country until AFL exerted its influence and now we have drop-in pitches. AFL takes the best young athletes and adversely effects our grounds and wickets.
DC
Guest
After a synopsis of our test woes, the moronic 2nd last papragraph encouraging more greentops is laughable. With so many good fast bowlers around, greentops are allowing them to rip through the batting sides. That is no way to encourage young batsmen to develop confidence. We will never have good young batsmen coming through the Shield system until we produce good batting strips.
Tim Holt
Roar Guru
The greatest tragedy has been the Death of the Perth Pitch- since Lawson got his jaw re arranged by Ambrose in 89 ( after walking in not wearing a helmut ) Every year since....it has become flatter...and flatter....
Sideline Comm.
Guest
I agree mate, it was an interesting article but we can't make bowler friendly wickets just to develop the batters. We'll end up in the opposite situation to the one we are in now: with a decent batting line-up but a poor bowling attack. "You don't weaken a strength to strengthen a weakness."
Chui
Guest
I commented these points to a friend the other day. Watching tests at the venues across Australia used to brilliant for the variety it offered. Absolutely something for everyone. From no spinners in Perth to two in Sydney, and every variation in between. Does that variety still exist at Shield level. Doubt it.
rawiller
Guest
Agree with that Luke. It would be good to see the SCG go back to turning square on the 3-4th days. Perth with steepling bounce and carry. etc etc
Ian Whitchurch
Guest
This. If you wouldnt fix a match with cash, drugs or thugs, dont fix it with a curator. Adelaide and Bellrieve are roads, Perth is bouncy, the Gabba seams, the SCG turns and the MCG is a two-paced bitch.