Now cover-up game begins

This Australian and England duo took one look at the outfield and rejected the conditions as being unfit for play. The problem areas were those square of the boundary where the areas were decidedly marshy.

According to inside information, both coaches Greg Chappell and Tom Moody were unhappy over the swampy conditions of the wicket on either side of the pitch. Their views were entirely understandable considering the risk of injury to players in the opening match of the series.

In what is seen as a belated lame excuse by the organisers, Tamil Nadu Cricket Association secretary Vijay Raghavan, said: ‘‘There was not enough time between the South Africa limited overs game and this first Test against Sri Lanka to organise covers for the entire field.’’

One of the questions being asked is why was it that BCCI, the millionaire body, cannot provide one of the country’s top Test venues with enough tarpaulins to fully cover the area.

Anyway, scuba gear is not a prescribed equipment for cricket fields, which leads us to the second query. Why was it that the BCCI changed the venues around when the Lankans were initially led to believe that the series would start in Kanpur, move to Delhi and then on to Chennai? This is the sort of communication that becomes fudged by officialdom in this area.

After all, once the South African match was rained off and news of Cyclone Baaz working its way along the coast, surely it didn’t require a crystal ball to alert anyone of the threat of heavy downpours and flooding.

In South Africa, the drainage at the five main Test venues is such that there is no need to cover the entire field — mainly that is large enough to cover an area as large as the 30 metres used for ODI games. There are other venues where ODIs are played where the entire fields have been covered.

Good news, if it can be called so. The skies had cleared by dusk and there were large chunks of blue, suggesting the cyclone had moved on and may be we’ll get some play after all. Well, that was the hope Sunday night.