Tis a bit hard to find pitch reports for the opening round of County Cricket.

I did find this, though....

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/99-94-cricket-blog/2022/apr/11/county-cricket-talking-points-april-greentop-theory-does-not-reflect-reality

Some juicy quotes;

"When you hear the usual suspects’ loud voices proclaiming that England’s “April greentops” make it too difficult to build long innings and too easy to take cheap wickets, you might want to reflect on how much county cricket they actually watch."

"Another name to watch this season, slow left-armer, Liam Patterson-White, chipped in with handy runs, but delivered match figures of 76.1–21–139–7 in the day job. Who says spinners can’t bowl in April?"

Someone must say that. Why?

And about the match at Lord's - "as the match drifted to the draw that seemed odds-on after the first hour, so little movement was there side-to-side or up-and-down."

There also appears to be a recent article in the Times about the County pitches, but it's paywalled.

Another deluded professional cricketer thinking pitches can be improved...
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/matt-parkinson-county-pitches-are-holding-back-a-generation-of-english-spinners-c2hrsz667

On Wednesday, April 13, 2022 at 12:11:32 AM UTC+1, jzfre...@gmail.com wrote:
> Tis a bit hard to find pitch reports for the opening round of County Cricket.
>
> I did find this, though....
>
> https://www.theguardian.com/sport/99-94-cricket-blog/2022/apr/11/county-cricket-talking-points-april-greentop-theory-does-not-reflect-reality
>
> Some juicy quotes;
>
> "When you hear the usual suspects’ loud voices proclaiming that England’s “April greentops” make it too difficult to build long innings and too easy to take cheap wickets, you might want to reflect on how much county cricket they actually watch."
>
> "Another name to watch this season, slow left-armer, Liam Patterson-White, chipped in with handy runs, but delivered match figures of 76.1–21–139–7 in the day job. Who says spinners can’t bowl in April?"
>
> Someone must say that. Why?

In the case of spinners it is simply a cliche . Before covered pitches in C C it was routine for counties to take two spinners into a match regardless of the pitch and quite common to see both bowling before lunch on the first day. Fred Titmus often came on as first change on the first day.

The problem is captains today don't trust spinners. Patterson-White is lucky that he is not only very talented (he bats well enough to be a no 6) but has an experienced captain in Mullally.

Spinners indubitably bowl best when they bowl in tandem . Sadly that is an increasingly rare sight. RH

On Wednesday, April 13, 2022 at 9:13:15 PM UTC+10, RH wrote:
> The problem is captains today don't trust spinners.

There's a reason for this. I've shouted it a 100 times.
Today's CC pitches are deliberately made to benefit the medium pacers.
I say "today", but the ECB and counties have been taking some steps to encourage spinners. Not too sure how that's going.

If that's not the reason, what is it?

On Wednesday, April 13, 2022 at 12:19:37 PM UTC+1, jzfre...@gmail.com wrote:
> On Wednesday, April 13, 2022 at 9:13:15 PM UTC+10, RH wrote:
> > The problem is captains today don't trust spinners.
> There's a reason for this. I've shouted it a 100 times.
> Today's CC pitches are deliberately made to benefit the medium pacers.
> I say "today", but the ECB and counties have been taking some steps to encourage spinners. Not too sure how that's going.
>
> If that's not the reason, what is it?

There are a number of reasons.

1. A captain using spinners intelligently has a much more demanding role than he does when has pace bowlers on the go.

2. A captain today has often has little knowledge of how to use spinners, a fact exacerbated by the number of foreigners captaining County sides. Obviously a captain from say SA or Australia is likely to have a different idea about using spinners.

3. Spinners are rarely presented with a rain damaged pitch which has dried out and produced a sticky wicket.

4. Pitch inspectors have to be factored into the consideration of what will be considered reasonable. This difficulty is enhanced because modern players are poor players of spin.

RH