Cricket Australia have staged a number of Sheffield Shield rounds using the pink ball, including the first one of the new season, and I played in one when they started a couple of years back.
It was awful. It was more to do with the venue than the ball because the Gabba has multi-coloured seats, and it’s not great to see a red ball, let alone pink!
The lighting didn’t help, either. The twilight period in Australia is very different to that in England. Here it’s a long, fading light before it gets dark. There it gets dark within 45 minutes. It just didn’t help to pick up length.
All states have played at least one at their home ground with the Adelaide Oval and Blundstone Arena, which is down in Hobart, the ones that got the highest praise from the players.
There have been mutterings recently about the game at Canberra, where the ball got chewed up, but that’s an extremely abrasive surface, and Test cricket doesn’t get played there anyway.
There’s no doubt, too, that some are unsure about how the pink ball is for a spectator, especially on television.
Players will have to adapt as well but there’s a much bigger picture, and it’s all about trying to grow the game and target different audiences by utilising different times of the day.
Test cricket is currently in a position where they have to try it. The white ball has very little durability. We’ve seen that in one-day cricket and they’re even having to use two new balls from the start now.
I’m sure there would have been a lot of speculation about the white ball when it first got used way back in the Packer days. There was talk that it wasn’t going to last and wouldn’t be easy to see, and we’ve all seen the game adapt to that and allow it to be a success.
There is hope that the pink ball has more longevity, but you don’t get the understanding until the matches start.
Change is hard to take for people. I’m very much a traditionalist but I see the benefits, and the responsibility the game has to keep growing.
IT won’t just be four-day State games in which the pink ball is used, with the third Test of the Australia v New Zealand series set to be a day-nighter.
I’m sure we will see a very good crowd at the Adelaide Oval for it, in what could be a decider, and that’s what we want.
Steve Smith and David Warner both scored half centuries in the opening Shield games, while Mitchell Starc bowled really well, too, so I think these domestic games have really helped the Australian players.
Yes, they’ve been playing with the pink ball, but they have grown up with the red cherry so they should have no problem adjusting back for the opening two Tests.
New Zealand are arguably the most exciting team in world cricket at the moment.
They had a brilliant series against England, and will run Australia close.
That series against England was played in great spirit, with some excellent cricket and really captured the excitement of the English public.
It’s been the most exciting build-up to a Trans-Tasman series for some time because Australia know it won’t be easy. Normally, Australia come into these series in good form and with a settled side but that isn’t the case this time.
Even so, I can’t back the Kiwis – I’d be shot down.
We will get three results, I’m 100 per cent sure. Both teams play in an attacking style and I wouldn’t be surprised to see games completed before the fifth day.
It will be tight, but I’m going for a 2-1 win to Australia – just!
This piece originally featured in The Cricket Paper on Friday October 30, 2015
