Why cricket is not in the Olympics?
Aug 16, 2016 at 1:28 PM
Australian bowling great Glenn McGrath feels that a pitch for day/night First Class matches with a pink ball need to have some grass, without that the matches will lose the charm.
“That’s been our experience in Australia,” he said. McGrath’s comments came at a time when BCCI is going to host the Duleep Trophy in Day/ Night format for the first time in the history of Indian cricket. The pink ball will be used on an experimental basis in Noida later this month.
McGrath is currently in India to train budding fast bowlers of India at the MRF Pace Foundation, McGrath shared his thoughts on the ongoing Olympics.
The holder of 944 international wickets feels cricket should be a part of the Olympic Games.
“Now you have Rugby Sevens in the Olympics, there is no reason why cricket should not be there. Perhaps you can have Twenty20 cricket. I liked it when cricket was played in the Commonwealth Games.”
Talking about Australia’s batting woe in Sri Lanka, McGrath said, “Playing spin in the sub-continent has been one of our concerns over the last few years. It’s not that we can’t play spin. It’s about our mindset going out there to play it. We have to be clear in our minds about our game-plan. Like when Mathew Hayden was here in 2001, him deciding to use the sweep effectively.”
McGrath has however praised Mitchell Starc’s bowling in Sri Lanka. “He is an attacking paceman. He pitches it up and gets the new ball to swing. When the ball gets older, he reverses it. And he’s got speed.”
The former pace spearhead admitted the Australian team faced a difficult task during the four-Test series in India early next year.
Australia, the current No. 1 in Test ranking, lost the Test series to Sri Lanka by a 2-0 margin. The third Test of the series is currently going on.