Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) head coach Chandrakant Pandit has batted for favourable home conditions in the IPL, while also clarifying that currently, the franchise is not in control of preparing the pitches at their home ground Eden Gardens.
Even though KKR have played only two games so far in IPL 2025, they started with an opening loss at home, against Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB), before winning the away fixture against Rajasthan Royals (RR) in Guwahati.
Within the first ten days of the tournament, there have been a few captains and support-staff members who have spoken about the home conditions the franchises get - whether favourable or not - as only five out of the ten games have been won by the home teams so far.
"Who will not be happy about that? I mean, this is a simple answer," Pandit replied when asked if all IPL teams should be allowed to have a say in conditions for the seven home matches out of a total of 14 they play before the playoffs.
KKR now play Mumbai Indians (MI) at the Wankhede Stadium on Monday, before back-to-back home fixtures against Sunrisers Hyderabad and Lucknow Super Giants at Eden. When asked specifically about who decides the nature of pitches in Kolkata, Pandit said: "See, as a coach, as a team management, whatever the surface has been provided to us, we play. The control, of course, that will be under [the] curator. And at this moment, the focus is definitely going to be on the next game tomorrow which we are playing [against MI]."
Pandit was pressed again at the press conference about who calls the shots when it comes to deciding pitches in Kolkata. Was the KKR franchise in charge of everything at the ground?
"No. In charge of everything at the ground… I don't know. That doesn't mean that they [the franchises] have a control of preparing wickets. I mean, ultimately, I don't know what is the system in different states or different grounds, whether the control is with the franchise. But, at the moment, what I understand is the surface which is given to us, as a team management, as a coach, as a captain, probably we expect something [helpful] to be provided. So, that's all."
"It's not the Chepauk [of old] where you play four spinners," CSK head coach says
The talk around the lack of helpful home conditions stirred up after KKR captain Ajinkya Rahane had said after their loss to RCB that they "would love to see the pitch helping our spin bowlers". KKR bank heavily on their spin duo of Sunil Narine and Varun Chakravarthy, who picked only a wicket each while trying to defend 174, as RCB won with 22 balls and seven wickets to spare. In reply to this, the Eden Gardens chief curator Sujan Mukherjee had said that as per the BCCI guidelines, franchises and players do not have "any say" in the preparation of pitches.
"As per the BCCI guidelines, it is clearly mentioned that the pitch and ground preparation for all IPL regular season matches is the responsibility of the chief curator of the host association under the guidance from the BCCI-appointed venue curator, and they will be the sole decision-maker regarding the nomination of practice and match pitches, as is the case for first-class matches in India," Mukherjee told RevSportz. "It is also instructed that the franchises and players shall not have any say in the preparation of the wicket. The BCCI chief curator is available to give any advice that is required, and will also be able to intervene if any issues arise."
Chennai Super Kings (CSK) head coach Stephen Fleming was a lot more scathing in a feisty press conference after their biggest home loss in the IPL, against RCB by 50 runs. Fleming said they had "no home advantage at Chepauk" anymore.
CSK have been known to stack their squad with spinners at the auction to make the most of the traditionally slow and turning tracks in Chennai. But their second home game of this IPL was more helpful for pace bowlers, proven by the RCB quicks Josh Hazlewood, Yash Dayal and Bhuvneshwar Kumar returning combined figures of 10-0-59-6.
"Well, as we've been telling you for a number of years, there was no home advantage at Chepauk," Fleming said. "We've won away from home a couple of times. And we haven't been able to read… we've been really honest with you. We haven't been able to read the wickets here in the last couple of years. So it's not new. We are trying to come to grips each day with what we get, and we don't know. We're having to work really hard to try and understand what the nature of each pitch is, and it's quite different."
Gujarat Titans' home victory against Mumbai Indians on Saturday was a rare occasion in this IPL so far when someone from the team management said publicly that they had asked for a particular kind of pitch to make things difficult for the visiting team.
"Mumbai have been preparing themselves by playing on a red [soil] surface. It was a deliberate effort from our side [to prepare that pitch]," GT assistant coach Parthiv Patel had said during an in-game interview with the commentators during the match. "We wanted to play on black soil. It's stopping a bit, and it's slightly stickier to start with."
The GT fast bowlers made the most of the conditions by taking the pace off the bowling especially while bowling to the MI middle and lower orders in a chase of 197, and got them a 36-run win.