England’s short boundaries ploy and India’s pitch doctoring blur the line between home-ground advantage and gamesmanship

Fresh from the mob who brought you made-to-order pitches, England are now considering shorter boundaries to heighten their home-ground advantage against Australia in the Ashes. 

On the back of India producing raging turners to help retain the Border-Gavaskar Trophy, the Australians should see all this gamesmanship as a feather in their baggy green caps

England captain Ben Stokes last month admitted he had instructed groundstaff at the five Ashes venues that he wants “fast, flat pitches” to suit their up-tempo Bazball style and now, according to a report in The Times, the home side is considering bringing in the boundary rope to help their power hitters. 

This is on top of Stuart Broad last week claiming the previous Ashes tour in Australia didn’t count because it was a “void series” due to England’s squad having to put up with biosecurity measures at the tail end of the COVID-19 pandemic travel restrictions.

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Unless he somehow ascends to ICC overlord status, the 4-0 victory to Australia will forever stand.

(Photo by Matthew Lewis/Getty Images)

England’s short boundary ploy looks like another case of mind games in the lead-up to the June 16 series opener. 

There is scope in the Laws of Cricket and ICC’s playing conditions to prevent England from bringing the rope in too far. 

The minimum distance for an international fixture is 65 yards (59.43 metres) from the centre of the pitch that is being used. But it cannot be more than 10 yards (9.14m) in from the perimeter fence. 

However, the devil, as always, is in the detail. 

For grounds that were built and used prior to 1995 when minimum boundary lengths were instituted, they are exempt from the 65-yard rule.

All five grounds for the Ashes are traditional venues with boundaries much shorter than the modern standards but only one of them can have the rope in closer. 

The first Test venue, Edgbaston, in Birmingham has small boundaries both square of the wicket and down the ground with the shortest at less than 50 metres. 

The Barmy Army in full voice at Birmingham. (Photo by David Rogers/Getty Images)

Lord’s, which will host the second Test, is quite a big venue by English standards which has a shortest natural boundary around 68m. 

For the other three Tests at Headingley, Old Trafford and The Oval, the grounds are only slightly smaller with each having a shortest boundary in the 65-67m ballpark. 

That means that England would be breaking the rules if they try to bring the rope in closer than 59.43m anywhere other than Edgbaston. 

Also, do you think Pat Cummins, Mitchell Starc, Josh Hazlewood or Nathan Lyon will be too worried if England try to hit them out of the park on a regular basis. 

Bazball has been a revolution in Test cricket over the past 12 months and England’s 10-2 record under Brendon McCullum shows that it’s not just a flash in the pan fad. 

But scoring fast doesn’t mean you need to hit sixes.

To mix Sir Donald Bradman and Snoop Dogg philosophies, sixes ain’t shit. 

Bradman, who only cleared the boundary six times in his prolific Test career, abided by his philosophy of keeping the ball on the ground to avoid being out caught. 

Pat Cummins celebrates a wicket at Edgbaston in 2019. (Gareth Copley/Getty Images)

It’s a much-different sport these days than when he made his first-class debut nearly a century ago with stronger players and bats that can send a six-stitcher into orbit. 

But not only is his theory timeless but Cummins and co will relish the prospect of England’s batters attacking them because it increases their chance of getting them out. 

Every Test-playing nation should use their home conditions to suit them. There is a fine line between making the most of your home-ground advantage and gamesmanship, especially in a sport which supposedly holds sportsmanship at the pointy end of its ethos of “It’s just not cricket” being synonymous with being unfair in any walk of life.

The fact that India prepared some raging turners in their four-Test series against Australia was totally their prerogative and with the toothless ICC unable to exert any meaningful sanctions on them, there’s little chance of that changing in the future. 

Where the problem was in India was that the poor state of the pitches robbed the fans of match play with the first three Tests over inside three days then the last one swinging dramatically the other way to a batting featherbed, which produced five days where a draw was seemingly inevitable. 

Ploys like tailoring pitches and changing the ground’s dimensions to suit are not new but it’s also a sign that a perception of bias from the ICC’s umpires is no longer a big issue. 

In the era of home umpires way back when, travelling teams often felt like they were playing against more than 11 people whenever they stepped foot on foreign soil.

Bill Lawry famously was never given out LBW in his 30 Tests as an opener for Australia during his career from 1961-71, the West Indies still think they were robbed in New Zealand in 1980-81 when they suffered their only series loss in the span of 16 years and the British Ambassador had to step in after England nearly went home early from Pakistan in 1987 when Mike Gatting blew up over the home umpiring, leading to the abandonment of play on day three of the second Test due to his infamous dispute with Shakoor Rana. 

Even though Tests are now back to one local and one neutral umpire in the wake of the travel restrictions that came about during the COVID-19 pandemic, the combination of the ICC’s elite panel and the use of DRS means there is no scope for home cooking, whether it’s subconscious or blatant. 

Even if England try to bring in the boundaries, there will be few eyebrows raised from the Australian camp. 

If they need to resort to such tactics, it is not necessarily a sign of desperation but an indication that they’re not as confident as they should be in Bazballing their way to victory over Australia after steamrolling to series wins over lower-ranked nations like New Zealand, South Africa and Pakistan. 

Former Australian wicketkeeper Ian Healy certainly thinks England are overthinking things.

“Boundaries are the least of their worries. Why would they bother?” Healy said on SENQ Breakfast. “There’s no need for that.

“Mis-hits will go for six, but that’s OK. Lots of modern-day mis-hits go for six anyway. I don’t feel that’s anything but clogging up your mind and overthinking too badly.

“They would know we’re going to bounce them. We’re coming at their armpits and their chest logos. So get your chest guards on. They’re going to make those square-of-the-wicket boundaries a little bit shorter so a mis-hit pull or hook might carry.”

The theatre of the Ashes is growing every week and there’s still more than six weeks left until the teams cross the first Test boundary rope, wherever it is placed.
with AAP