Lord’s pitch creates fresh problems in England–Pakistan Test as MCC summons specialists
England and Pakistan contested a Test at Lord’s in which the pitch produced extravagant seam movement and occasional unpredictable bounce during the fourth innings, prompting the Marylebone Cricket Club to bring in outside help. The MCC issued a statement early in that fourth innings and said “independent specialists” were “confident that there are solutions to improving pitch quality and performance”.
The wicket used in this match was not judged as calamitous as the surface for the June Test against New Zealand, which led to an apology from the MCC and an International Cricket Council rating of unsatisfactory. Nevertheless, the Lord’s pitch again generated enough unusual movement and bounce to revive long-standing complaints about playing conditions at the ground. The curators’ problems this summer have been compounded by a season of nationwide drought interrupted by rain that affected both of Lord’s Tests.
The sort of deliveries that caused problems for Jacob Bethell against New Zealand and for Emilio Gay in England’s second innings at Lord’s were likened in the piece to the unpredictable balls of the 19th century. Historical examples cited include Surrey walking off the wicket in 1859 and Sussex doing the same five years later. Alfred Lubbock was quoted recalling earlier Lord’s behaviour: “At Lord’s it was a common occurrence to have three shooters and the other ball out of an over of four bump right over the batsman’s head.” Lubbock was described in the piece as one of the finest batters of the 1860s, a bronze medallist at the pole vault in the 1868 British athletics championships and a participant in the 1875 FA Cup final.
The article noted broader consequences: between the two Lord’s Tests it was announced that the World Test Championship final next year will be played at the Oval because of concerns about Lord’s. The MCC’s statement added: “Our ground is not alone in facing challenges around pitch preparation and the executive have had productive conversations with their counterparts at other venues facing similar challenges both within cricket and across the wider sporting world.” It said the club was seeking “four to six leading experts with diverse skillsets and knowledge” to form an agronomy advisory group.
Individual performances and season statistics at Lord’s were also affected by the challenging wickets. Saud Shakeel was dismissed for 97 on Sunday, and that dismissal meant this was the 43rd year in which Lord’s has hosted two or more Tests and the first of those years in which nobody scored a century. The piece stated that only four batters reached three figures if all their scores were combined and that three of those required four innings to do so; it added that the last year in which no names were added to the batting honours board was 1995.
The batting average at Lord’s this year was given as 16.57, described as the lowest since 1958, when Jim Laker and Tony Lock took 14 wickets between them as New Zealand were bowled out for 47 and 74. The article said five five-wicket hauls had been recorded in Tests at the ground this year, a total bettered only once when three games were played in 2010. It noted Pakistan were involved in two of those 2010 matches, losing convincingly to England and, in a match that marked the Test debut of the promising young leg-spinner Steve Smith, to Australia.
The MCC signwriter Kevin Oakley had been busy adding names to honours boards and the ground’s programme of fixtures was summarised as four County Championship games, three men’s or women’s Tests, two List A matches and 11 days of T20 or Hundred action. The article concluded by reporting the MCC’s stated intention to “establish Lord’s as a global benchmark for pitch quality” and by detailing the club’s active search for external agronomy expertise as the next step in addressing the issues at the ground.