It was supposed to be a historic event as Afghanistan were set to face New Zealand for the first time in Test cricket. But even on the second day of the match, no play has been possible so far at Test cricket's newest venue - Greater Noida Sports Complex Ground raising a lot of questions about its future. There was a spell of rain on Sunday (September 8) evening and that was enough to call off the opening day of the Test match.
Despite having clear skies overhead for the entire day, the damp conditions at the ground created a player safety issue that forced the abandonment of the first day. The umpires conducted a total of six inspections before finally calling off the day around 4 PM local time. One of the umpires - Kumar Dharmasena - clarified that they were not happy with the patches inside the 30-yard circle with one of the players (read Ibrahim Zadran) already getting injured.
"When you compare it with 10 am till now, there's an improvement but we're worried about five to six patches inside the 30-yard circle. One area of the run-up does not look comfortable. It's a player safety issue. We even saw one player get injured yesterday as well, we know how hard it is. Both of us are concerned," Dharmasena said while speaking to the host broadcaster at the end of the day.
For the unversed, Zadran slipped while fielding on the eve of the Test match to injure his left heel. He has now also been ruled out of the upcoming ODI series against South Africa starting on September 18. Coming back to poor facilities and a sub-par drainage system at the venue, a spell of rain on Monday evening has worsened things and hence, play is yet to begin on the second day as well and for now, it seems unlikely that even toss will take place today.
Meanwhile, the Afghanistan team is also not happy with the facilities in Greater Noida and they might not want to play at the venue again in the future. A team official, while speaking to ESPNCricinfo, stated that Afghanistan wished to play the Test match in Lucknow, Dehradun or Kanpur. But it wasn't possible with Lucknow and Dehradun hosting T20 leagues while Kanpur is scheduled to host the second Test between India and Bangladesh later this month and preparations for the same are currently in progress.
It remains to be seen if Afghanistan will prefer playing at this venue in future but for now, all eyes will be on this one-off Test to see if play is possible at all over the next three days.
