Well-cooked pitches serve up too many raw deals

We took away the weapons from proud warriors and fed them to the lions. This was not cricket for at its very heart is a contest between bat and ball; equal skills with equal opportunity. The bowler must run in believing a wicket is round the corner, the batsman must square up thinking a run could be had.

But this was like pitting top swordsmen against AK 47s, like giving a painter of miniatures a thick brush to work with. It was insulting. We might as well pack up anybody who can turn an arm over decently and send them to Guantanamo Bay.

Bowlers, like artists, can be sensitive and ambitious too. They can fret over a ball marginally down the leg side, they can sulk over slip being a foot too fine. But you cannot get a result without them and so you must understand them too, be aware that they have a heart that is aggressive and tender at the same time.

In the last 10 years, courtesy of one-day cricket, we have hunted them down mercilessly, occasionally we have reduced them to machines, and if we continue to have pitches like these two, we might as well insert an obit.

If a pitch has too much grass on it, or too much bounce, or too much dust and bowlers look a bit larger than life, everybody frets and fumes because the batsmen are the blue-eyed boys of the game. When Australia played India at Mumbai and we had a two-day Test, the match referee was not impressed. And with good reason for there was no surface there. But these pitches would not have produced a result in seven days and that is just as bad.

It was a mockery of a contest and the situation was worthy of being mocked at too. Rahul Dravid made a polite statement by giving Dhoni the new ball. He might as well have bought 10 newspapers, asked his team to sit just inside the ropes with legs folded and read them while he himself bowled left-handed.

I think we also need to be sensitive to the needs of those that watch the game. Spectators do cricket a favour by giving it their time and some hard-earned money. Without spectators and viewers the game would be broke and we need to respect that. If they do us the honour of patronising our game, we need to respect them by giving them a fair contest.

You cannot belittle them as happened in Chennai, by taking their money without giving them cricket. The PCB needs to apologise to its audiences, at the very least, for dishing them out a farce.

And what of the sponsors who paid for a prize horse and got delivered a mule? In business such a contract would be annulled. Sponsors, advertisers, television networks and 8212; in parts of the world 8212; viewers have paid a premium for this series.

When you charge premium prices you deliver a premium product in a premium ambience. That is your responsibility. You cannot say to them: oops, my groundsman did not have enough time to prepare a wicket unless you agree to them saying : oops my accountant made a mistake, I cannot pay you. Are sponsors allowed to get it wrong? Can their cheques bounce?

If ESPN Star turned up saying sorry we don8217;t have enough cameras, or if I arrived unprepared saying my mother-in-law was unwell, there would be serious consequences. I don8217;t see anyone talking about that. And this was two blunders in a row.

I think people need to be hit where it hurts. Cricket in our part of the world really only understands money and I can assure you that if there was a fine of a million dollars for a Test match that was ruined by poor preparation, we would get acceptable conditions in spite of hardships. Nobody would provide rickshaws then for the price of a Ferrari.

I hope we don8217;t go the other extreme in Karachi. All people want is a good fair wicket. You wouldn8217;t have thought it was so tough would you?