Mark Taylor comes down hard at Indore pitch; accuses India of dishonorable behaviour

Former Australian captain Mark Taylor, in conversation with Sydney Morning Herald came out all guns blazing over the pitches used in the India-Australia series and termed them as poor.

"I agree with that," Taylor said of the ICC rating the Indore pitch as poor. "I definitely think the pitches have been poor for the series, to be totally honest, and obviously the Indore one was the worst of the three. I don’t believe a pitch should be going through the top on day one," he said.

India are currently leading the series 2-1, and have already retained the Border-Gavakar Trophy. While criticising the Indian pitches, Taylor defended the Gabba surface on which a test between Australia and South Africa ended within two days.

"You might understand that day four or five if the game goes that long, but not day one, that's just poor preparation. I thought Indore was a very poor pitch and should have been ranked accordingly. I think they've got to keep an eye on that sort of stuff because people look at the Gabba this season. The groundsman there just got it wrong," the former opener said.

He further went on to say that the Indore pitch was so poorly curated that it turned the game into a lottery and brought the Australian spinners into the game much more than Indian thought.

"He left too much grass on it but, in a way, it didn't favour either side. It would have favoured the South African seamers just as much (as Australia) because they've got four very good seamers. So I don't think there was any skulduggery going on at the Gabba. I think with Indore, I hope I can say the same thing there, but what happened there, was the pitch was so poorly prepared that it actually made the game a bit more of a lottery, which didn't favour India at all. It probably brought Australia's spin bowlers into the game a lot more than they (India) thought it was going to," he added.