Pitch guru defends Matador Cup decks

Renowned cricket curator Les Burdett has defended the state of the pitches in the ongoing Matador BBQs One-Day Cup and encouraged his peers around the country to embrace the unique characteristics of their venue for the benefit of the game at international level.

Burdett retired from his post at the Adelaide Oval in 2010 after 41 years in the job, but was brought on board by Cricket Australia as a ‘pitch consultant’ to oversee the preparation and maintenance of the pitches at the five suburban venues playing host to the one-day competition around Sydney.

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The pitch at Blacktown International Sportspark for the match between the West End Redbacks and the Tasmanian Tigers last week was questioned by Wide World of Sports commentator Tom Moody on Twitter, as well as man of the match Tim Paine.

“We thought it was going to be slow and low, but it was diabolical to be honest,” Paine told cricket.com.au after scoring an unbeaten century.

“It was much softer than we thought.

“It was slow, but it was seaming and popping and a bit wet. It was an interesting first half an hour.”

While Mitchell Johnson has only featured in one match of the three-week tournament so far, the Australian fast bowler also took to Twitter to share his thoughts on the pitches during yesterday’s match between the Commonwealth Bank Bushrangers and the NSW Blues.

Excluding matches involving the Cricket Australia XI to create a more like-for-like comparison with last year’s tournament, the average first innings total over the past fortnight has been 246.77. That’s down on the the 2014 tournament, which saw an average of 274.46 across the 13 completed matches in Sydney.

The competition this year has been largely devoid of high-scoring run chases – only five of the 18 matches have been won by the team batting second – but Burdett believes it’s not necessarily a bad thing for Australia’s best cricketers to experience conditions that will test their skill and mental fortitude.

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“I think the cricketers have to be realistic about what their expectations are,” Burdett told cricket.com.au.

“The five grounds that we’ve been at here in Sydney are all different for different reasons. You look at Bankstown and Hurstville, both don’t have too much winter traffic on them so of course in October you expect to find them with plenty of grass and not too much damage.

“Then you look at North Sydney, Drummoyne and Blacktown where they’ve had quite a bit of winter traffic, some more than others.

“I’m a realist and you go in with your eyes open knowing how much harder it has been for the staff to pull it together.”

Centuries scored by Paine and NSW Blues opener Ed Cowan at Blacktown, as well as Dom Michael’s for Tasmania in Drummoyne on Saturday, were made all the more impressive given the conditions on the day.

While the pitches have been accused of being slow, it’s hard to say they have nullified high-quality fast bowling when Mitchell Starc needs just two more wickets to break the competition record for the number of wickets in a season.

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“Whether you’re in Adelaide, Sydney or Brisbane in October after coming through winter, your pitches are never really quick,” said Burdett, who is loving his new role in semi-retirement.

“Your pitches quicken up through December and January when the grass is growing and established, the soil is warmer and everything is working for you as a curator. Then you can produce really good pitches.

“Having said that, the pitches I’ve seen thus far have been terrific. Some have played a little slow, but you’ve got to expect that at this time of year.

“Sometimes you can look at a scoreboard and say how the pitch has played, but you’ve got to look a bit deeper than that and look at the calibre of the batsmen and bowlers.”

The pitches used for the Commonwealth Bank Test Series against India last summer were labelled ‘disappointing’ by Test spearhead Johnson, while the ECB was accused of directing groundstaff to prepare pitches in a particular fashion during this year’s Ashes contest.

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Burdett strongly believes that curators should be preparing pitches for the benefit of the game and allowing players to showcase their skill and technique for what he describes as an “honest competition between willow and leather”.

“Our cricketers who learn their trade playing in Australia, they learn it well because they’re playing on varying pitches,” Burdett said.

“The pitches in Australia are different for a combination of soil type, climate, time of year and methodology.

“They’re not all the same, and it would be boring if they were all the same.

“The last thing we want to do is what they do in England where they all have the same clay and soil, and sometimes get told when and when not to roll them.

“Our curators, all they want to do is produce good pitches so good cricket will be played on them.”