Ravi Shastri fires back at Australian media over pitch doctoring ahead of Nagpur Test

Ravi Shastri (Source: Twitter)

The Nagpur pitch is in the news for all the wrong reasons as the allegations of doctoring are surfacing in the Australian media. 

The claims are based on some images that show how the pitch has been treated with less water on one side so that it gets difficult for Australia's left-handers at a later stage.

However, former Indian head coach Ravi Shastri has refuted the claims made by the media saying that all these concerns are invalid as they have personally never felt the need to think much about conditions overseas, no matter what the length of the grass is.

"That is bulls**t! It’s more hype than anything else surrounding this first Test match. It always happens, you get 15mm grass, 18mm grass or 12mm grass in different places around the ground at the end of this first Test, I’m sure there’ll be someone who scores a hundred.

"If someone can get a hundred or 80-plus on that pitch, they’ve played well and he will go and say, ‘What’s wrong with the pitch? You stay there, you apply yourself, your shot selection is good, you get runs. But if you go out there and think you’re going to smash every ball, good luck to you."

India's first Test against Australia begins on 9th February at Nagpur and is quite crucial for their World Test Championship (WTC) chances.

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