{"id":272456,"date":"2025-11-19T23:08:11","date_gmt":"2025-11-19T23:08:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/272456\/"},"modified":"2025-11-19T23:08:11","modified_gmt":"2025-11-19T23:08:11","slug":"the-ashes-perth-pitch-exactly-the-same-as-quick-waca-strip-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/272456\/","title":{"rendered":"The Ashes: Perth pitch ‘exactly the same’ as quick Waca strip"},"content":{"rendered":"

The pitch for the first Ashes Test will be “exactly the same” as the fast and bouncy surface at the iconic Waca, says the chief curator.<\/p>\n

The series opener. which begins on Friday, will be the first Test between England and Australia played at the Perth Stadium with the Waca no longer used for men’s Tests.<\/p>\n

It features a drop-in pitch that is produced off-site from the same soil as the surface at the previous ground, which was one of the quickest in the world.<\/p>\n

“Pace and bounce is what we pride ourselves on,” Isaac McDonald told the BBC.<\/p>\n

“That comes from our wicket soil, which is exactly the same as the Waca.”<\/p>\n

Drop-in pitches are common in Australia where stadiums host other sports, such as Australian Rules Football (AFL).<\/p>\n

While there has not been a Test against England, Perth Stadium has held five previous Tests.<\/p>\n

The data suggests<\/a> that balls pitching just short of a good length reach the batter at an average of 1.04m, exactly the same as the Waca and the second-highest in the world.<\/p>\n

“It is exactly the same soil used,” McDonald said. “The base of it is identical. <\/p>\n

“The only difference is it is in a big steel tray and gets dropped in by a big crane. The characteristics are exactly the same.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The pitch for the first Ashes Test will be “exactly the same” as the fast and bouncy surface…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":271912,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[1721,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-272456","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cricket","tag-cricket","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/272456","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=272456"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/272456\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/271912"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=272456"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=272456"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=272456"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}