The pitch has a significant effect on the performance of all batsmen and bowlers.
PITCH TYPES
Types of pitch available :
- Uneven
- Cracked
- Hard & Fast
- Green
- Flat
- Slow
- Dusty
The following is a rough guide to how the type of pitch can affect your players – but keep in mind weather, fitness, form and player preferences also play a part in how a player may perform…:
| Batting | Fast | Fast Medium | Medium | Spin | |
| Uneven | -1 | +1 | +2 | +1 | 0 |
| Cracked | 0 | +2 | +1 | +1 | +1 |
| Hard & Fast | +2 | -1 | -1 | -2 | -1 |
| Green | 0 | 0 | +1 | +2 | 0 |
| Flat | +2 | -2 | -2 | -1 | -2 |
| Slow | -1 | -2 | 0 | +2 | +1 |
| Dusty | +1 | +1 | 0 | +1 | +2 |
Pitch square – preparing multiple pitches
Your groundsman has a wicket square at his disposal – you can see all the games due to be played at your ground in the next week and you can give individual orders for preparing each match pitch.
You can set a ‘default’ pitch type that will be used if you do not set specific orders for each match pitch.
Pitch change options become available exactly 7 days before the match is due to start.
From the next daily update for your country after that it will start to move towards either your default pitch request, or if you have made a different one, then to the requested pitch for that match.
Pitch preparation is not on a straight sliding scale. You always start with a green pitch – from there, there are two different lines of preparation that your groundsman can go down:
- From Green towards Flat > Slow > Dusty
- From Green towards H&F > Cracked > Uneven
Sometimes you will play a match on a pitch in its transition stage – i.e. when preparation is on its way from say Green to Flat, you will go through a stage of Green/Flat, and then Flat/Green prior to having a Flat pitch. If a match is played on a transitional surface, elements of both type of pitch at play in the match. Any players with preferences for either type of pitch will get their bonus on these types of pitches.
Pitch – how quickly does it change?
It takes a full 7 days to get to Dusty or Uneven pitches that are furthest away from the starting point i.e. from Dusty with a starting point of Uneven or vice versa.
First Class matches – pitch deterioration
In First Class matches, the pitch deteriorates continuously throughout the match, moving 0.324 of a level in a 24 hour period (0.0135 per hour, which is a change of 0.095 from the start to the end of a single day’s play). What is displayed on the ‘pitch condition’ on your ‘ground’ page won’t necessarily show the up-to-date condition. This is because the exact* pitch condition is updated here only at each of the 18 global daily updates during a 24 hour period (the list below shows the times of the 18 updates).
00:00 (IND)
00:30 (BAN)
01:00 (SRI)
01:30 (PAK)
02:00 (AFG)
03:00 (KEN)
03:30 (ZIM)
04:00 (SA)
05:50 (NED)
06:10 (SCO)
06:30 (ENG)
06:50 (IRE)
11:00 (WI)
11.30 (CAN)
12:30 (USA)
18:00 (NZ)
19:00 (PNG)
20:00 (AUS)
Although a day’s play is processed in the 20 minutes before the start time, pitch deterioration is factored into the calculations during this processing.
With a starting point of exactly green the deterioration will move away from green as the game progresses – roughly a third of a level per day (0.324 in a full day).
- Green > Flat > Slow > Dusty
- Green > H&F > Cracked > Uneven
If your default pitch is green, you can influence the path the deterioration heads down by starting to prepare the pitch you’d like it to move towards before the match processing starts (more than 20 minutes prior to the start of the day’s play).
If your default pitch is anything other than green it will continue to move in the direction away from green from which it is currently heading.
*When a pitch is between two types it is displayed on the ‘pitch condition’ of your ‘ground’ page either:
Pitch A .|. Pitch A/Pitch B .|. Pitch B/Pitch A .|. Pitch B
However, if pitch A is equivalent to 0 and Pitch B is equivalent to 1 then the pitch could be said to be anything from 0.000 to 1.000, with 0.000 being absolute Pitch A, 0.333 being absolute Pitch A/Pitch B, 0.667 being absolute Pitch A/Pitch B and 1.000 being absolute Pitch B.
Therefore anything from -0.017 to 0.017 will display as Pitch A; Anything from 0.017 to 0.5 will display as Pitch A/Pitch B; anything from 0.5 to 0.083 will display as Pitch B/Pitch A; and anything from 0.083 to 1.17 will display as Pitch B.
In November 2022 Allan confirmed that with the new match engine, their has been no change to how pitch types suit different bowler/batter types.
More in-depth notes about each pitch – thanks to karl_w_w
Uneven
Very volatile, wickets will fall but runs can be scored quickly.
Good pitch to use if trying to upset a stronger team.
Cracked
Rewards orders that are a little more defensive than normal.
Secondaries are very useful on this pitch.
Hard & Fast
A little better for bowlers than flat, wickets can fall.
Green
Easier batting in the middle overs than at the start – more of a contrast than on other pitches.
Flat
Batsman’s playground.
Spinner’s nightmare.
Dusty
Easily the best spinner’s pitch.
Not as bad for batsmen as the other bowler friendly pitches.
Slow Helps defensive bowlers more than attacking ones. Good pitch if you want to neutralise your opponent’s fast bowlers but still give your own bowlers something to work with.