ICC T20 World Cup 2016: 5 Hits and 5 Misses from the Super 10 Stage

Miss: Pitches

The pitches prepared during the Super 10 stage were disappointing

A tournament in India, especially at this time of the year means runs, loads of it. However, the pitches on offer during the Super 10 stage of the World T20 proved to be dampeners of this expectation as runs were hard to come by. Though there were a few games where totals of 200 and above were seen, a majority of the games were low scoring.

In some games, the pitch disintegrated and the ball started turning square in the first few overs itself. The pitch at the VCA stadium in Nagpur especially came in for a lot of flak.

The poor quality of the pitch in the Super 10 opener between India and New Zealand prompted the ICC to appoint pitch consultant Andy Atkinson. However, things didn’t really change after that as the highest score at this venue was 126 and scores as low as 123 were successfully defended.

Even at the other venues such as Bangalore, Kolkata, and Dharamshala, the pitches were heavily skewed in favor of the bowlers which meant that an even contest between bat and ball could be barely witnessed. Given that the ICC looks at the World T20 as a tournament which can take the game to a truly global level, it certainly needs to look into the kind of surfaces that have been on offer in the tournament so far. Maybe, it can be a lesson for future tournaments