'Curator Should Be Held To Account': English Great Slams MCG Pitch For Failing To Meet Standards Of Five Day Game

The 2025-26 edition of The Ashes has failed to live up to the expectations and there are now two ways about it. Two Test matches out of the four ending within two days is something that no cricket fan asked for or expected. The Melbourne Test match saw England win their first Test match 'Down Under' since 2011, but it is the pitch at the 'Mighty G' which has faced a lot of criticism during the course of the Test match.

Australia have already won The Ashes 3-1 and all England can do now is gain their 3-2 moral victory. Despite the pitch playing all kinds of tricks, the Aussies will have to believe that they were reckless with their batting in the fourth Test match of the series.

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Geoffrey Boycott Slams The MCG Pitch

The Melbourne Cricket Ground has been the talk of the town with 20 wickets falling on the first day of the 'Boxing Day' Test and 36 wickets falling across six sessions of the Test match. What surprised fans and experts even more was the fact that no batter either from Australia or England could score a fifty, let alone a hundred. Former England opener Geoffrey Boycott has now called for the pitch curator to be held accountable for how the pitch behaved during the course of the fourth Test match.

'That is not good enough and the curator should be held to account by his bosses. No excuses are acceptable. Talk of him being worried about the very hot weather later in the Test will not wash, as it was all over before the sun arrived. The pitch had too much grass on it and failed the standard expected for a five-day Test,' wrote Boycott in his column in The Telegraph.

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The Big ICC Verdict

The International Cricket Council (ICC) recently gave its verdict on the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG) pitch and deemed it as unsatisfactory. Under the Pitch and Outfield Monitoring Process, the stadium has been handed one demerit point.