Different Types of Cricket Pitches

There are many types of cricket pitches and each of them has its own attributes which make it either batsmen or bowling friendly. Pitch does play a vital role as far as the overall result of the game is concerned and that is why you will see a pitch report at the start of every game. The nature of pitch can determine things like the number of runs that can be stored in the match, the decision of the captain winning the toss, the length of the match in case of a test game, and so on. This is why the pitch is the most important part of a cricketing field and to understand the game properly one has to learn about different types of pitches.

Dead Pitches:
The most common wickets that are prepared these days are batsmen-friendly dead wickets. These pitches have no support whatsoever for the bowlers and batsmen love batting on them. These pitches are dark in color and have a solid feel about them. Every single bit of grass is rolled in, and all the moisture is taken away. This is the most common type of pitch that you will see in a T20 or ODI match. These are real nightmares for the bowlers.

Dusty Pitches:
Dusty pitches are common in Sri Lanka and on many grounds in India. As indicated by name the surface is soft and the clay is not rolled in hard in this type of pitches. These wickets are prepared mostly to assist spin bowlers. Spinners can turn the ball a lot more due to losing the surface as the ball grips a lot more. Having said that the batsmen don’t have a very hard time playing on these wickets as the bounce is low.

Green Tops:
These are graveyards for the batsmen and fast bowlers absolutely love to bowl on these surfaces. These wickets have a thin layer of grass on the good length area which causes the ball to seam and move after pitching. These wickets are a nightmare for the batsmen because it is almost impossible to judge the magnitude of the movement that the ball gets after pitching. Matches at these tracks are usually low scoring and you will see lots of wickets falling in these matches. These pitches are mostly used in Test matches especially in England and South Africa.