The Ashes: International Cricket Council verdict on MCG pitch revealed

The International Cricket Council has revealed their verdict on the MCG pitch that produced 36 wickets in two days of wild Boxing Day Test cricket.

The Melbourne surface has widely been condemned after the second two-day contest of the series that ended in England’s first victory on Australian soil in 14 years and prompted head curator Matt Page to apologise in a press conference.

And now the verdict everyone was predicting is in.

The venue has been docked a demerit point, with ICC match referee Jeff Crowe labelling it “unsatisfactory”, the second lowest rating possible, above only “unfit”, under the four-tiered system.

“The MCG pitch was too much in favour of the bowlers,” he stated in his official assessment.

“With 20 wickets falling on the first day, 16 on the second day, and no batter even reaching a half-century, the pitch was ‘Unsatisfactory’ as per the guidelines, and the venue gets one demerit point.”

The ground would need to incur another five demerit points over the next five years to be banned from hosting international matches.

The last three Boxing Day pitches have received “very good” ratings, including 2024’s epic five-day contest against India, but it is not the first time in recent history the venue has been hit with a demerit point for a poor surface.

In 2017, the deck was given a “poor” rating after the snooze-fest Ashes draw that saw Alastair Cook compile 244 runs unbeaten across 634 minutes of batting.

That match prompted the MCG to call in Page, who was the WA Cricket curator at the time, to oversee the revitalisation of the surface.

Australian coach Andrew McDonald launched a passionate defence of the MCG pitch boss on Monday.

“A lot’s been spoken about the pitch, and just off the top, I want to talk about the evolution of that and the job that Matt Page has actually done in getting it from where it was to where it is now,” he said.

“It’s always a tricky balance, a fine balance and he does an outstanding job. The perspective I always use is that we have bad Test matches as well, we had a bad Test match first Test match last summer, this Test we weren’t at our best, and sometimes these things can happen.

“But we support him in what he has done, and we’re really proud of the evolution of the MCG. So hopefully people can have some context around where he’s been on the journey, and people can support him for the next challenge that he faces.”