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Living up to the expectation, the Lord’s surface behaved like a pacers’ paradise. However, England cricket legend Michael Vaughan is absolutely not happy with the pitch as it produced uneven bounces throughout Day 1 of the England vs New Zealand 1st of the 3-match Test series.
On the first day of the first Test, the pacers of both of the sides had enjoyed their spells. Traditionally, the English pitches are known to have extra bounce and swing. But on the first day of the ongoing ENG vs NZ match, batters of both teams were mostly struggling because of uneven bounces, which, for Michael Vaughan, was an alarming sign.
Wickets galore at the Lord's during Day 1 of the England vs New Zealand 1st Test
Batting first in the first innings, Ben Stokes-led England cricket team could register only 140 runs at the expense of 10 wickets inside the 40th over. New Zealand pacer Kyle Jamieson returned as the most successful bowler, with 5 wickets in 14 overs. Nathan Smith and Will O'Rourke took 3 and 2 wickets, respectively. For England, Harry Brook was the main scorer in the first innings with 56 runs from 71 balls.
"From what I've seen on that pitch today, there have certainly been several balls where we've seen snickoffs, and we've seen a lot of LBWs where the players have been kind of on the front foot playing a forward defence. The balls just thudded into the pads, which tells you that the pitch is a little bit inconsistent in terms of bounce,” Vaughan told the BBC Test Match Special.
England comes back into the contest through their pacers
New Zealand confronted trouble as soon as they returned to the ground with the bat. At one stage of the innings, the Kiwis were three wickets down for only 2 runs on the board as Ollie Robinson claimed three wickets in his first over of the match. At the stumps, New Zealand were 61 for 6.
In those 16 wickets that fell on Day 1, six batters in total were dismissed for LBWs, which might be because of the uneven bounce on the track.
Michael Vaughan seeks clarification from MCC over the degrading Lord's pitch
Vaughan further mentions that witnessing 16 wickets in a single day was a royally entertaining instance for him. But still, he believes that batters lost control because the pitch was not good enough to bat on. Addressing MCC, the former England captain points out that for a few years, the pitches have not been up to the mark.
“I've been royally entertained. 16 wickets on day one. I don't think it's a good pitch. I think the MCC will be the first to admit that there's something not quite right with this square at Lords. It has been an issue for a few years now, since we had the test match against India last year," he added.
"Brilliant game, and it was a great finish to a test match, but the pitch wasn't great. And the test match being so good in the end, I guess, stopped us all talking about the pitch. This isn't a great test match wicket, but we're royally entertained. I'm sure we'll have a great test match."
