Darren Lehmann lambasts the tosses in cricket matches

Australian coach Darren Lehmann has had a good reason to lament about a lot of things. Although he is considered as one of the best man-managers in recent times, it seems quite clear that he has a good reason to be upset. This time around, Lehmann has lashed out at the toss system stating that it gives the winner an advantage he does not deserve.

This was written in Lehmann’s autobiography where he singled out a few pitches the Aussies played on in the 2015 edition of the Ashes Test series.

“I accept Twenty20 represents a significant challenge to that -and to the health of one-day international cricket, too -but the biggest challenge to the longest format,for me at least, comes not from Twenty20 but from the surfaces on which matches are being played,” Lehmann wrote. “Put simply, those surfaces are either far too bland or, conversely, are far too heavily weighted in favour of the home side. In both instances, that does Test cricket no good at all.

“On the other hand, no one wants to see 600 plays 500 on pitches that offer the bowlers nothing. Producing tracks like that is the surest way to kill off the format,” he added.

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He also added that abolishing the toss system would be a good idea. “My solution to ensure the best possible pitches are produced is, at international level, to do away with the toss, with the visiting side given the option of whether they want to bat or bowl,” he said. “That way the result is not decided by the toss of the coin, host boards have a greater incentive to produce decent pitches that are fair to both sides and the chances are that after five days the better side -rather than the one that has called correctly and thus been able to take advantage of favourable conditions -is the one what will come out on top.”

“(The pitches) were so heavily weighted in favour of the home side that it helped to ease my conscience about our heavy losses to some degree,” he said. “Yes, we were not good enough in the key moments and we played the moving ball very poorly, but the pitches on which those matches were played could hardly be said to have produced an even contest between bat and ball.”