The image of Test cricket - already shaky - received a major blow this week with no play taking place for two days at Kingsmead in the first Test between South Africa and New Zealand, despite there being fine weather at the ground on Sunday and yesterday.
Social media has squarely blamed Kingsmead for the debacle, with some saying that the Durban ground should lose its Test status.
Ground manager Brett Proctor even received a call from a Johannesburg radio station yesterday asking for his comment on the ‘fact’ that the ground was no longer on the Test roster.
There seems to have been little or no understanding of the circumstances behind the public relations disaster that has effectively ruined the match with New Zealand on 15/2 in reply to the Proteas’ first innings of 263, with the final day’s play taking place today.
The facts, however, tell a very different story, and place full responsibility on Cricket South Africa for their decision to ‘decompact’ the Kingsmead outfield in order to make it softer for the fielders in South Africa’s first winter Test.
The decision came about when CSA claimed that it had received complaints of a hard outfield from both South Africa and New Zealand this time last year, when the two teams played a series of limited-overs matches at Kingsmead and Centurion.
This was acknowledged in a statement yesterday from the chief executive of CSA, Haroon Lorgat.
He said: “Following our first experience during August last year and the feedback received from both teams, we have re-laid the outfield to make it more suitable for Test match cricket.
“However, the unseasonal rain at this time of year had impacted our preparations of the newly laid outfield. The flood conditions more than a month ago had affected the decompacting process at Sahara Stadium Kingsmead.
“SuperSport Park, on the other hand, was re-laid by ‘overseeding’ it with a winter grass, and the results have been impressive.
“It is most unfortunate and certainly beyond our control that the heavy unseasonal rains in Durban had impacted our plans. We are sympathetic to the efforts of all the ground staff who have tried their level best to ensure match readiness.”
While Lorgat acknowledges CSA responsibility for the decision to scarify and decompact the outfield, he leaves out two salient facts.
In the case of Centurion, the “overseeding” process took place in April, shortly after the end of last season, so the grass had plenty of time to grow back.
At Kingsmead, however, the process only took place after the completion of the Comrades Marathon in early July.
Another factor that caused problems was that the scarifying process itself was bungled, with the machine digging too deep into the Kingsmead outfield, resulting in 40 tons of soil being lost and creating significant areas of grassless dust.
A further consideration is that it appears that the Black Caps did not complain about Kingsmead last year.
The tourists did, however, complain of a hard outfield at Centurion, where the winter-white outfield had to be painted green.
When Black Caps coach Mike Hesson was informed about the reasons for the condition of the outfield before the match started, he told The Mercury last week: “We had no problem with Kingsmead last year. The outfield wasn’t ideal, but it was okay. It was Centurion that gave us a problem.”
The Mercury spoke to CSA grounds consultant Hilbert Smit last week, and he said: “In hindsight we would like to have done the job earlier, but we don’t live in a perfect world and the Comrades didn’t help.
“It won’t look good on TV, but I still believe the ground will be softer for the players.”
As it turns out, however, the ground was so much softer that it forced umpires Richard Illingworth and Ian Gould to abandon play two days in a row despite sunshine and drying conditions.
Ironically, Pakistan’s rise to No 1 in the Test rankings yesterday came after the last four days of the West Indies-India Test in Trinidad were lost because of a wet outfield. Only 22 overs were possible on the first day before heavy rain caused the rest of the match to be abandoned. - The Mercury