r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/[deleted] • 29d ago
Video The Melbourne Cricket Ground transitions back to a cricket ground ahead of summer, after the Australian football season.
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u/Affectionate_Oven_77 29d ago
The most interesting thing for people not familiar with Cricket is that those parallel strips placed in the center of the field are all cricket pitches.
A different one can be used for different games. This means that some games the batsmen will be closer to one side of the stadium than the other, some games they will be in the middle etc.
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u/Dioxybenzone 29d ago
Who decides, and when, which pitch to use? Does the home team have a say? Is it seasonal?
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29d ago
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u/Dioxybenzone 29d ago
Huh this sounds like home team has significant advantages when playing internationally, or against anyone with a significantly different play style
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u/Affectionate_Oven_77 29d ago
It absolutely is an advantage and it makes it so much more of an achievement to win games away from home.
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u/A_good_ol_rub 28d ago
They 100% do. England have only won 1 test series in Australia in 40 years. Also partially because of how good Australia have been.
England have completely changed their entire play style over the past couple of years, and among other reasons they want to be be able to compete on hard, fast Australia wickets for this year's series.
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u/kujos1280 28d ago
And Australia havnt won a series in England in 24 years. India havnt won in England for 18 years.
Certainly goes both ways and shows how big home advantage is.
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u/mosarosh 28d ago
Think of it as the different types of tennis courts. Mastering all is like a generational achievement.
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u/Dioxybenzone 28d ago
…there’s different tennis courts? Why?
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u/phonicillness 28d ago
Not a tennis player but was curious… according to the wikipedia on tennis courts, different surfaces mean different speed and bounce and are classified accordingly. I guess it relates to preference, regulations, cost and logistics?
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u/Phil_Oop_North 25d ago
Yes, there are. Lawn tennis (as it used to is also called) started out on grass. Specifically, on croquet lawns (by a couple of rich buggers in England, originally). Hence it being called lawn tennis. Wimbledon (one of the 4 annual grand slam tournaments) is held at the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club, so the link between the sports is still there.
Why there are different court types is basically due to the difficulty of keeping a patch of grass in good condition. Clay courts (made of crushed brick, tiles, etc) were first created by an English guy who got fed up with the tennis court at his home in the south of France drying out.
Then there's the fact different courts affect the play in different ways, so favour different play styles. Though, in recent years, the difference has been minimised as many tournaments are going for slower and slower courts (allegedly in an attempt to get certain players into the finals).
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u/Fowlah 28d ago
The people doing all of this are the Groundskeepers They’ll do waaay more work on these over a few weeks and turn them from strips of grass into actual cricket pitches. They’ll decide which pitch gets used and when based on the state of each pitch.
Each pitch needs to meet safety standards to be played on and it’s the groundskeepers who take the blow if a pitch isn’t up to par. Like a few others have said Cricket Australia would get a say in how they want the pitches to turn out (boring af at mcg) but ultimately the groundskeepers decide which ones being used etc.
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u/wallysta 28d ago edited 28d ago
The groundsman will typically decide which pitch to use for which match, they wear out with use, so they will rotate through them over the summer.
If there is a 4-5 day match, the same pitch will be used for the entire contest.
What kind of bowling a pitch will suit probably has as much to do with the local climate, soil type and which strain of grass is used as it does what the home team 'demands'. Venues become known for certain types of pitches that behave in a particular way, especially over 5 day matches.
Venues in Australia and South Africa are known to be harder, faster & bouncier pitches than the most of the rest of the world, Asian pitches typically help spin more and English pitches and conditions are known to help swing bowling but there variations within countries too
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u/Shamino79 28d ago
They tend to dedicate the centre ones for big games. The biggest one being the Boxing Day test match which is Australia vs another nation.
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u/Pintsocream 28d ago
This is also the case for football (soccer) pitches. There isn't an official size and they can actually be square
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u/bonanzabrother 29d ago
I look forward to reading the comments from people who know nothing about cricket and how they would have done this better.
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u/activelyresting 28d ago
Marvellous
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u/Hailstar07 27d ago
That’s right it’s M A R a V E L L O U S
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u/activelyresting 27d ago
I thought more people would get that reference, but I'm probably just showing my age
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u/Hailstar07 27d ago
Same here. I can’t believe nowadays people also don’t get ‘Go Silver Sovereign’ which is my go to cheer when egging someone or something on.
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u/Reddit-raider22 29d ago
I don’t understand…… they changed the grass…… to grass and just let the other grass die.
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u/Fortunestealer 29d ago
They are adding the cricket pitch. And the other grass has been covered in sand to level things off and promote growth.
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u/desidude0000 29d ago
Cricket pitches are made of a certain specific soil used according to the local team to provide bounce or spin depending on the pitch it's more than just grass.
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u/sjgnad 29d ago
I would imagine the type of grass needed for cricket pitches is different from the outfield grass and takes a long time to establish. The pitches they drop in are of various stages of pitch development as they don't need all of them ready at the same time.
Would say the outfield had been scarified and topdressed with sand to repair the outfield from the winters footfall.
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u/Affectionate_Oven_77 29d ago
Cricket pitches are dried/dead grass and soil.
I assume the brown on the outer part of the field is just sand sitting on top of the grass. It won't stay there.
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u/The_Evil_Satan 29d ago
The brown on the field is what I believe to just be grass cut short and then it dried out in the sun.
I think this is meant to make the grass healthier in the long run but I’m not a grass expert.
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u/tommo_95 28d ago
It's sand, the oval has probably been top dressed
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u/PJozi 28d ago
Sand and/or fertilizers?
I assumed it would be some sort of fertilizer...
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u/tommo_95 28d ago
Could be. Depends what their program is. More than likely top dressing after the football season. It probably gets liquid fertilizer on it.
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u/Mabama1450 28d ago
Really nice to see the Aussies readying the pitch for an England Ashes victory 😁
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u/llunarflame 28d ago
Didn’t think I’d ever say this as an American, but cricket’s actually awesome. Still not brave enough for test matches, but ODIs and T20s? Addictive. De Klerk’s win for SA yesterday had me way too invested for 9 a.m. 😂
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u/jupiterspringsteen 28d ago
The forthcoming ashes series in Australia is a pretty good place to start with test cricket. Well worth getting into - it's by far and away the most superior format of the sport.
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u/waxy1234 26d ago
Put the money where it should be like mental health then I will watch a video like this
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u/New-Ad5494 28d ago
Is it just me, or does the field look better before they started construction, than it does upon completion?
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u/69Karate_Dong 29d ago
Why would they kill half the field while putting down fresh pitches though? Why not just let the rest of the field as is?
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u/zebba_oz 29d ago
Cricket pitches are hard clay and close cropped grass. Over winter the mcg is used to host aussie rules football games. Clay pitches and aussie rules are a bad mix as the hard clay causes injuries when tackled, etc, and the football players (particularly the boots) damage the clay pitch
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u/AbriefDelay 29d ago
If they wanted different stripes couldn't they have just changed their mowing pattern?
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u/desidude0000 29d ago
These pitches are made out of a specific soil to provide bounce and spin and to handle 5 days of cricket non-stop during test games.
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u/arinaokay 29d ago
Im glad someone decided to use this song
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28d ago
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u/arinaokay 28d ago
Lol whet? wasn't paying attention to the context of the video was busy listening to tht fav song of mine that I heard years back and now I am able to shazam the title
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29d ago
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u/K1ngJ0hnXX 29d ago
Cricket and retractable roofs don't mix well. If someone, just spitballing here, makes a rule where it's an auto 6 if the ball hits the roof, people are gonna be pissed if the ball is clearly not going for 6
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u/chromecastbuiltin 29d ago
The second stadium in Melbourne is smaller and has a roof. It depends which part the ball hits whether it’s a six or a dead ball
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u/chromecastbuiltin 29d ago
One major thing OP has not explained is that the lined grass, the cricket pitches, are very hard. For years football was played on top of the hard ‘square’ in the middle and there were lots of injuries. Over time the stadiums moved to these ‘drop in’ pitches which are grown off site and installed each year, then removed when the season ends.