Hamilton ODI: more wet weather, more uncertainty around the pitch

Two days out from hosting the third New Zealand vs India ODI, Seddon Park is bathed in sunshine. It's a deceptive Sunday-afternoon scene, with Hamilton having experienced wet weather on Saturday, and with more rain expected on Monday and Tuesday.

Karl Johnson, the head groundsman at Seddon Park, is busy getting the ground ready for the match. A lumbering, tractor-mounted machine is rumbling over the outfield; Johnson says it's called a verti-drain: it's armed with tines that punch holes into the outfield to improve aeration and enable faster drainage in case of rain.

All of New Zealand has experienced an unusually wet start to November, and this, Johnson says, is likely the biggest reason behind the way the pitches for the ODI series have behaved so far. During the T20I series that preceded the ODIs, Auckland and Wellington hosted incredibly fast-scoring games, with New Zealand posting a record 259 at Eden Park, and India chasing down 199 in just 13.2 overs at Hnry Stadium. But the first two ODIs - which weren't just played at the same venues but on the same pitches as well - were dominated by the fast bowlers, with New Zealand sent in twice and failing to survive past 41 overs on both occasions, on pitches with seam movement and steep, sometimes uneven bounce.

Johnson says the unseasonal rain has left groundstaff with limited time to work on pitches ahead of the ODIs, which means they have had to fast-track preparation and leave surfaces to sweat under covers for long periods.

The effort, he says, has been to prepare pitches that stay consistent through 100 overs, with minimal seam movement, but this has been complicated by the unpredictable weather.

"New Zealand's been pretty wet over the last few days, and we've had quite a lot of rain here yesterday, so we've lost out some time but we've been able to get the pitch ready," Johnson says. "Good day today, beautiful day today, Sunday, matchday minus two. Forecast isn't great for tomorrow and matchday is not flash either, so we're trying to fast-track our pitch, because when they sit under our covers, they do sweat a bit. So yeah, the weather's been challenging for all the other guys around the country too."

Johnson expects the pitch to be under covers for significant periods over the next two days. "Tomorrow probably looks like half a day," he says. "We might be okay in the morning, we might lose out in the afternoon. And then matchday looks a bit challenging as well.

"But again, [the weather] does change, it's changing rapidly because we're having these storms come through. So it's difficult to pinpoint it down to time and stuff. So we're just trying to do a whole lot today."

This means the pitch ends have already been marked, and watering has stopped earlier than usual. "If the forecast was pretty decent, we could still be putting moisture back into the pitch, but it isn't, so we've stopped all that."

Johnson says groundstaff typically "bruise up" pitches and "take the colour out", so they look and behave like typical ODI surfaces, with minimal seam movement. By this he means the grass is rolled against the hard surface of the pitch so it doesn't stand up as much as it might on, say, day one of a Test match.

"Our rye grass in New Zealand is [what gives pitches] pace, so that the ball kisses off [the surface]," Johnson says. "For a Test match, we'll have a lot more moisture in it to start the game. That's why our wickets do look quite green for our Test matches in New Zealand.

"But that's what we need to get them through [five days]. It's a fuel tank. We've got to have enough fuel at the start of it so that it gets through the five days. Day two would be your one-day international pitch, so there's no seam movement, it's still good to bat on. That's what we're hoping for."

Because of the weather, the bruising process has begun earlier than normal, and watering has stopped earlier than normal.

The soil type that goes into the Seddon Park pitch, Johnson says, could help make the groundstaff's job a little easier.

"We've got Patumahoe soil here," he says. "Patumahoe helps us. It does dry pretty quick. We used to have Kakanui and Waikare, sort of swelling clay, back in the day. And they were a lot slower to prepare.

"So this works in our favour around our conditions. They talk about the environment changing, the climate in the world - we're experiencing that. We're getting more storm events in New Zealand than we ever used to. So that's something we do need to be able to manage."