Spin bowlers, such as Australia’s Nathan Lyon, have spoken in favour of day-night cricket while the India captain, Virat Kohli, and the former Australia captains Mark Taylor and Steve Waugh have recognised the importance of embracing anything that could increase Test cricket’s popularity in the future.
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Australia and New Zealand will be involved in the first D/N Test which begins in Adelaide from Friday.
Day-night matches at worldwide level have been limited so far only to one-day and Twenty20 games, which are played with a white ball.
Irish says while players should be given credit for allowing the Adelaide Test to go ahead, it should be seen as purely an experiment. The contrast with Australia’s first two daytime Tests of the current series against New Zealand could not be starker-with low turnouts and funereal ground atmospheres in Brisbane and Perth-yet again bringing into focus Test cricket’s ability to survive in a modern sporting environment.
While we do get the odd lovely summer’s evening that would be flawless for watching Test cricket, for the most part I’d fear for those fans who have paid good money only to sit wrapped in blankets – not much fun in a slow-burn session.
“It might be a step that we’ll all remember a few years down the line, let’s hope so”. A few hours after Brian Johnson put down the microphone, the stage was taken down, the pitch lowered into place and 800 square metres of turf was replaced at the Cathedral End.
Day-night Tests will offer a novelty factor while in its infancy, but cricket needs to be careful that it does not become the plaster over a gaping wound.
“Personally, I think the public’s going to vote with their feet and you’ll see huge crowds turn out at Adelaide”. Both these two nations has not played a test match series since November 2011.
Opinion between players is polarised about the ball’s visibility in the twilight zone, and some batsmen reckon it hoops round corners after dark. During the day it was still fine.
Keith Bradshaw, chief executive of South Australia Cricket Association, and a prime mover in the pink-ball concept, has described interest in the fixture as “Ashes-like”. “But when the floodlights are not on and when the sun is going down, is when they found it hard”, Kohli said. “Whether the Kookaburra pink ball is the right answer I don’t know, but we won’t know until we try it and I think as a sport we have to do that”.
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“We just have to see how he scrubs up tomorrow”, Hesson told reporters.
