South African skipper Dean Elgar was critical of the Gabba pitch after losing the opening Test against Australia within two days, calling it a “pretty tough” course that did not allow for a “fair” match.
A staggering 34 wickets fell in two days as South Africa were bowled out for 152 and 99, while Australia claimed a six-wicket victory.
“I’m still trying to wrap my head around what happened. Fairly spirited wicket, bowlers licking their lips.
Challenging for the batters, which is okay, but on the other hand, I don’t see this as a fair game,” Elgar said after the game.
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PremiumIt was the second fastest Test ever completed in Australia as only 867 balls were bowled, taking 15 wickets on the first day and a further 19 on the second day.
“You have to ask yourself if that’s a good advertisement for Test cricket,” Elgar told Foxsports.
“I asked the umpires … how long before it becomes potentially unsafe.” It was the first time in 91 years that a Test has finished within two days in Australia and former players including Mark Waugh also criticized the surface.
“I guess you have to ask yourself: Is this field too grassy? I think the gardeners will look into that,” Waugh said on “Fox Cricket.”
“We know the Gabba has grass, but I don’t know, it looks a little unfair to the batsmen at the moment.” Former Australian skipper Ricky Ponting also slammed the wicket, which proved to be a minefield for batters, saying it could receive a “poor” rating from the ICC.
‘I’ve never seen anything like it in the Gabba. Matthew Hayden has played a lot more cricket here than I have and he has never seen anything like it. And Justin Langer said the same thing,” Ponting said on “Channel 7.”
“There was a bit of moisture on the first day – which you expect from The Gabba. What we’ve seen is excessive seam movement.
“I think it will get a bad review. To drop 22 wickets in the first four sessions of a test match tells me these are very, very good bowling teams, no doubt about that. I don’t think the hitters are that bad.
“When I spoke to some of the players this morning, they think it’s the hardest ground they’ve ever played on. A lot of these guys have played a lot of cricket. They’ve played a lot of cricket. They’ve played on some pretty heavy wickets on different places around the world. So probably pretty justified at this point,” Ponting added.
Former opener Matthew Hayden, who has played a lot of domestic cricket with Gabba, said: “…it started too green in my opinion.
“And that’s just from someone who’s seen this from a young age, there’s no need to make it so full of grass, such a heavy grass content. Because it sewed too much.