England cricket team skipper Ben Stokes was taken aback by the pitch for the fourth Test match against India in Ranchi and said that he has “never seen anything like that before”.
The fourth Test match starting on Friday is a must-win encounter for England if they are to stay alive in the 5-match Test series since they currently trail 1-2. However, a couple of days before the match begins, Stokes is unsure what to make of the pitch.
“I’ve never seen something like that before. I have got no idea so I don’t know what could happen. If you looked down one side of opposite ends it just looked different to what I am used to seeing, especially out in India. It looked green and grassy up in the changing rooms, but then you go out there it looked different: very dark and crumbly and quite a few cracks in it,” Stokes told BBC Sport.
There is a possibility that the Ranchi pitch might aid spinners and that is something that England would not mind given that they have several spin bowlers in their ranks. “If it does spin from ball one, it takes the toss out of the equation, then it’s an even playing field,” Ollie Pope told reporters.
“A lot of the time the wicket starts out flat and then deteriorates. We won the first game batting first, India the last two batting first. It doesn’t define the result if you bat first on slightly flatter wicket but it does give you an advantage,” he added.
