FLEM’S VERDICT: India's poor pitches creating nail-biting play but not attractive Test cricket

The BCCI and the ICC need to have a chat about fixing the problems with the pitches in India. 

If a team’s innings collapses because they’re batting poorly then bad luck and you end up with a three-day Test.

But no one can tell me that these pitches for the India vs Australia series have been up to a standard that we want for a marquee match-up like this one against the two top-ranked teams in the world.

Look at the averages of the batters. They’re now talking about getting 30s like they’re hitting 80s. 

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And then look at the bowling averages and the economy rates of the spinners. 

Rohit Sharma is stumped by Alex Carey. (Photo by Robert Cianflone/Getty Images)

Reverse swing hasn’t been a part of this series because it hasn’t gone long enough. I like the quicks being able to do that. 

When I played in India there were always raging turners but generally the batters could score runs in the first innings. 

The pitches have been below par and Indore’s third Test strip was quite rightly rated below par by the match referee

I want to see an even contest between bat and ball. I don’t mind if it’s breaking up massively on day four and five. 

It’s not attractive cricket, it’s nail-biting because you think a wicket could be happening every ball but really, on the first two days the batters should be able to enjoy consistency of pace and bounce. 

The pitches have been the poorest feature of this series. 

Even Rohit Sharma when he scored the only hundred of the series in the first Test at Nagpur, he talked about how he never got settled. 

We’ve had three successive three-day Tests but the second match should have gone into day four but the Aussies under-achieved big time with the bat in their second innings and it was over in a flash. 

There was optimism after day two about not only extending the Test but winning it so we can’t totally blame the pitch in Delhi for it being another three-day game.

But last week in the Indore pitch when you could see balls going through the top of the surface in the first hour, you knew it was not prepared properly for Test match cricket. 

And now we’ve got a situation where the BCCI and the local officials in Indore are arguing over whose fault it was and there’s a couple of different strips being prepared for the fourth Test in Ahemedabad.

It’s amazing how drastic the turnaround has been in the past week since Australia won the third Test.

They seem to have all the momentum and India look like they’re the ones under pressure even though they’ve already retained the Border-Gavaskar Trophy irrespective of what happens in the last Test. 

I can’t see the Aussies making any changes to their line-up. The balance was just right last time with Mitchell Starc as the sole quick and Cameron Green as the all-rounder rolling his arm over for a few overs in the first innings before the three spinners took over. 

It would be enormous if Australia can win this last match and square the series. 

If they lose and it ends up 3-1 then that’s probably just a pass mark, you probably would have expected that kind of result at the start of the series and then there’s been a bunch of injuries and players having to go home. 

But if they can get up in Ahmedabad that would be ultra impressive. 

(Photo by Robert Cianflone/Getty Images)

With the two young spinners – Todd Murphy and Matt Kuhnemann – bowling well to back up Nathan Lyon, we now know we’ve got a line-up that can be successful the next time Australia goes to the subcontinent. 

Travis Head has shown he can be an opener in these conditions, the other batters have done well in the trying circumstances and Green, with his long reach, showed last week that he has the game that can translate to Asian pitches. 

The one who I’d love to see get some runs in this Test is Alex Carey. His glovework has been outstanding up to the stumps to the spinners with the ball coming through at all heights and angles but I’d like to see him get in, not rely on the sweep and build an innings in Ahmedabad because that will give him plenty of confidence the next time he has to play in this part of the world. 

And it will be pretty exciting to see if they can break the world record for the biggest crowd in a Test. 

That’ll be a huge buzz for the boys if that can happen with Anthony Albanese and India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi in attendance.

If we do get the victory and the series is locked up at 2-2, perhaps the two PMs can have a net after stumps on the last day and whoever comes out on top gets the Border-Gavaskar Trophy.

I think Albo was a cricketer in his younger days so I reckon he’s probably a better bowler than John Howard. 

John Howard demonstrates his modest cricket skills with Australian and Pakistan troops in 2005. (AP Photo/Australian Army, Neil Ruskin, HO,FILE)

I used to have a Lunch with Flem segment on Channel Seven and got to interview cricketers, sportspeople and famous names about cricket and one of the highlights was one I did with John Howard. 

He’s a fanatical cricket lover, he was often in the dressing rooms when he was PM back when I was a player and when we won the World Cup in 1999 we got invited to The Lodge. 

One thing I did for that segment was to get HawkEye to do a pitch map of his two famous deliveries at a media opportunity in Pakistan when he barely bowled it past his run-up. 

It would be even better if we actually had a fifth Test in this series to be a fair dinkum decider in case the Aussies win this match. 

The next time India come to Australia is going to be a five-match contest and I believe it’s going to be the same when we head back over there in 2027 and that’s the way to go. 

I hate two-Test series and particularly in a place like India where wet weather isn’t going to throw up the occasional draw like it does in England or Australia, playing five makes sense so you are less likely to end up with a drawn series. 

And with the amount of three-day Tests at the moment because of the pitches, the players are getting plenty of time off in between games to rest and recover.