Steyn asks for better pitches

“You’ve got to bowl teams out to win Tests and they (those who’re preparing the track) know that as well. So they’ve got to be able to prepare a wicket on which bowlers are able to pick 20 wickets,” Steyn said.

Earlier, before the start of the Test, Steyn’s partner-in-pace Makhaya Ntini too had mentioned that “wickets need to be prepared in a manner where bowlers have a role to play.”

South Africa’s first innings total of 540 and India’s reply of 627 happened on a wicket that offered hardly any help to fast bowlers, medium pacers or spinners. The weather hasn’t helped the ball swing either. The next two venues in this three-Test series happen to be Ahmedabad and Kanpur, which are also seen as batsman-friendly pitches. The last Test match in Kanpur was between the the same teams, a match that ended in a dull draw, with both teams registering huge first innings totals. In Ahmedabad, a Test match was last played in 2005, when India beat a depleted Sri Lankan team.

The current series, however, should be different. With both teams competing for the No 2 spot in the ICC rankings, the least the bowlers from either side would expect is for the playing conditions to provide a balanced competition.

The Board of Control for Cricket in India has repeatedly said they will prepare more sporting surfaces. That doesn’t seem to be happening right now.

After his triple century, Virender Sehwag had joked that the “pitch would crack only on the fifth day.”