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STORY HIGHLIGHTS
There’s plenty of chat about how the pitches prepared this season are not helping teams enjoy the home advantage in IPL 2025. After the defending champions, Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) captain Ajinkya Rahane first complained of how the Eden Gardens pitch for the tournament opener was not to the team’s liking, assisting seamers more, others jumped onto it, with CSK, LSG and even DC putting their complaints forward. The BCCI has answered them all.
The drama surrounding the KKR pitch curator controversy took an ugly turn after Eden Gardens curator Sujan Mukherjee U-turned on denying any requests from the franchise, days after admitting to preparing the pitch (for the RCB clash) his way, engaging everyone. It came to a point where renowned broadcasters Harsha Bhogle and Simon Doull openly criticised Sujan for not working in tandem with KKR’s directives.
Meanwhile, following Lucknow Super Giants ‘ home game against Punjab Kings earlier, the team mentor Zaheer Khan didn’t mince his words in accepting that the pitch prepared for the clash that ended with the touring team winning by eight wickets failed to support LSG’s bowling strengths, and never looked like being prepared by LSG curators.
“What was a little disappointing for me here, considering it’s a home game, and you know, in IPL, you’ve seen how teams have looked at taking a little bit of home advantage, you know,” Zaheer said after his team lost in a one-sided contest against PBKS. “From that point of view, you’ve seen the curator is not really thinking that it’s a home game. I think maybe it looked like, you know, it was (the) Punjab curator out here.”
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Besides KKR and LSG, Chennai Super Kings coach Stephen Fleming also expressed his reservations over Chepauk’s wicket for the RCB tie (which CSK lost), with a Times of India (TOI) report suggesting that Delhi Capitals were also unhappy with how the pitch in Vizag (their second home venue) behaved in their first two matches.
Meanwhile, the BCCI has instructed the Delhi management that the board’s designated curator has the ultimate authority, and neither the franchise nor the players have any say in pitch preparation.
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“The pitches have been good so far. Hence, they may be asking for pitches that have more help for bowlers. But there needs to be better communication between the franchise and the curators. It can’t happen within a week of the IPL season,” a BCCI source said as quoted by TOI.
“As far as Lucknow is considered, the square needs to be re-laid to alter the basic nature of the pitch, which is intrinsically slow in nature. According to BCCI guidelines, it needs to have a good grass cover to sustain itself through the tournament. The same goes for all other venues,” the source said while speaking of concerns around the Lucknow pitch.
(With inputs from agencies)
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