Australia v New Zealand: Preparing the SCG as a turner will help Aussie cause in Bangladesh

Australia have a Test tour of Bangladesh mid-year where Nathan Lyon and co will assume the bowling burden. So why not give them a boost and restore the SCG to former glories, says Robert Craddock.

Nathan Lyon of Australia reacts after Usman Khawaja dropped a catch in the slips on day two of the Fourth Test match between Australia and India at the SCG in Sydney, Friday, January 4, 2019. (AAP Image/Dan Himbrechts) NO ARCHIVING, EDITORIAL USE ONLY, IMAGES TO BE USED FOR NEWS REPORTING PURPOSES ONLY, NO COMMERCIAL USE WHATSOEVER, NO USE IN BOOKS WITHOUT PRIOR WRITTEN CONSENT FROM AAP

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Do groundsmen ever play New Year’s pranks?

I overheard a couple of cricket fans on Tuesday quipping they’d like to see the SCG ground-staff go rogue and give the local deck the biggest haircut its ever had before the third Test and surprise us with a “bald as a badger’’ deck for the Test.

The joke went that groundsmen could even shout “let’s make Sydney great again’’ as they strode up and down the pitch with their mowers with grass flying everywhere as spin bowlers from both team’s looked on with saliva dripping from the corner of their mouths.

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Nathan Lyon has endured plenty of frustration at the SCG over the years.

It won’t happen of course but you could certainly do worse … much worse.

The theme of what they saying spotlighted a significant point.

With a two-Test tour of Bangladesh looming mid-year Australia needs practice on not just turning decks but mega-turners like they will get on tour.

There’s no point struggling against spin in Bangladesh then saying - and I promise you this will happen - “the problem is we don’t have spinning decks at home any more and Sydney does not turn like it used to.’’

Just as the MCG pitch was on trial in the last Test – and rose to the challenge most impressively – so is Sydney under the microscope in this match after too many years of being a flat, featureless deck.

The match strip looks greenish, entirely presentable and should play well enough but that is actually part of the issue. It’s played so well in recent seasons that India made 7-622 last summer and Australia 7-649 and 8-538 in the two seasons before that.

Bob Holland took 21 wicekts in three SCG Tests in the 1980s.

One of the reasons Australian spin bowling – magnificent Nathan Lyon apart – is struggling is that Sydney and Adelaide in recent years no longer provide major assistance in helping slow bowlers improve their figures and their self-esteem.

In bygone eras interstate slow bowlers use to talk about taking 15 or 16 wickets in Sydney and Adelaide Sheffield Shield games, which would be part of a 30-wicket summer which would be a pass mark.

But Adelaide does not crumble like it used to and Sydney is something of a “Nothingburger’’ deck.

That’s why the Shield returns of most interstate tweakers this summer are far too offensive to be printed in this family-sensitised publication.

The SCG’s demise as a spin bowling venue is evident in Lyon’s figures, for he has found it one of his most challenging grounds anywhere in the world.

Lyon has been excellent in Adelaide Tests (50 wickets at 26), impressive in Brisbane (35 at 29), steady in Melbourne (31 at 34) and a surprisingly withering force at Perth’s new Optus Stadium (14 at 15).

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But in Sydney, due to the lack of pace, bounce and turn, he has taken just 26 wickets at 47 from nine Tests, statistics which say far more about the surface than the bowler.

Spinners used to rule at the SCG.

In the 1980s when Australia could not win anywhere else, they would roll in Peter Sleep or Bob Holland or Peter Taylor in Sydney and snatch a Test, Richie Benaud would wallow in it in the commentary box, and suddenly Australia would finish a glum summer with hope and a smile on its face.

Curators need to learn that the world craves variety and a dry, cracked wicket is not a bad deck at all.

Where’s that mower?