Make Dream Team using Pitch Report – Dream 11 Team Tips

Making your Dream team using Pitch Report is hard sometimes because looking at the pitch photo or video is more important than reading or listening to the pitch report.

Sometimes the captain at the toss time misjudges the pitch and we go with their decision, but just listen to what they say after the toss what is the actual reason for choosing batting first or bowling first?

If you see a valid reason, then you can go with the captain’s decision because sometimes the captain just decides to bat first because they have been bowling first for the last 3-4 matches.

There are different types of Pitches, especially in India some are made of total black soil clay and some are a mixture of red and black soil while in rare cases we see pure red soil pitches.

How to Make a Dream Team Using the Pitch Report?

Making your dream team using Pitch Report is not that easy, you need to check a few points before selecting the players.

• Player Recent form
• Player Matchup with other team bowlers
• Pitch Report and batting order of the player
• Pirch Report and Bowling overs of the player

On Batting Friendly Pitch:

• On a batting-friendly pitch where the captain chooses to bat first and there is no grass visible, consider selecting five batters from the team and death over bowlers from the first team. Additionally, pick a spin all-rounder from the second team.
• If the pitch has a pure honeycomb-like structure and dew might come then pick more batters and fewer bowlers, in this case target might get chased or you can see more runs in this match.

On Bowling Friendly Pitch:

• If you notice a grassy portion on the pitch, consider dropping one of the opening pairs in favor of a powerplay bowler from the second team which is in good form.
• If you see the wind is flowing, or cloudy weather, or moist pitch then in any condition pick more bowlers and drop all out-of-form batters with those who play risky shots this might be a low-scoring match.

Law of Average:

Many players follow this rule, suppose any batsman or bowler is playing today with recent fifties or great scores or a century then lots of people will pitch that player in their dream team.

But if you see there is no such favorable condition today for that player and the matchup against the other team bowlers is also not that good plus the law of average says no player can perform continuously so you can drop that high selection player from your dream team.

Pitch Report and Match Results:

Let’s discuss the Pitch Report shared in IPL 2024 and how the match resulted; I will share how that happened and what you can do for upcoming matches.

LSG vs CSK at Lucknow

In the Match between LSG and CSK here LSG chased down the target because it was a red soil wicket/pitch and it became batting-friendly in the second inning the same as the red soil pitch at Wankhade.

The LSG bowlers took wickets with pace variation and Spin on this ground, and the first-inning batting team lost 6 wickets while the second-inning batters lost only 2 wickets.

A few Stats worked here:

1. Lucknow is the home ground for the LSG Team
2. The Red Soil wicket becomes batting wicket/spin-friendly after the first inning.
3. In the first inning, the Red Soil wicket helps pace and bounce
4. Little dew can help batting second.
5. KL Rahul Batting second is a good option

 ACA-VDCA Cricket Stadium, Vizag

In Vizag, the pitch was looking PaTa a flat black soil+red soil mixture with no grass with small ground dimensions.

Here KKR Batted first scored 272 runs and stopped DC at 166 all out. Here Pacers took 14 wickets and the spinner 3. DC wickets fall due to the pressure of chasing a huge target.

A few Stats worked here:

1. PATA Pitch and Huge Target against the Opponent
2. The huge target made DC lose early wickets.
3. Lucky Day for KKR and Bad Day for DC.

LSG vs GT & LSG vs DC at Lucknow

In the Match, the pitch was made up of black soil and with little grass covering, the even pitch helped batters to score in the first inning and GT Lost the match due to poor batting.

The Batting on this pitch could have been better in the second half as the score was not that big and this pitch got better in the second inning.

A few Stats worked here:

1. Lucknow is the home ground for the LSG Team
2. GT’s Poor Batting led them to an out situation.
3. GT Need a Middle Order batter

In the LSG vs DC match the Pitch was tricky, with big cracks if you have noticed it had a grass covering, and the great Kuldeep Yadav took the most important wickets here including Pooran letting LSG the low score.

MI vs PBKS & RR vs PBKS Mullanpur

Both the time Pitch looked like Black Soil with grass covering. The Hardness of the pitch and small dimensions led the team to score high in the first inning with the loss of 7 and 8 wickets respectively.

We saw Suryakumar Inning here on this ground because of his favorite area that was just 59 meters away he scored 78 runs that day.

Rest as the pitch shows it’s pace-friendly you will see 7+8 wickets fall in two matches’ first inning for an average total of 175.

Both times the target was about to chase but against MI Punjab got fallout and in the RR vs PBKS case RR chased down with just 3 wickets in hand.

A few Stats worked here:

1. Gree Pitch with Black Soil always helps pacers.
2. A hard pitch lets the ball come to the bat nicely.
3. Swing bowling can help to get wickets
4. 25 runs per wicket is the score here.

RR vs RCB at Jaipur

The Pitch looked very good for batting, flatbed, even grass, and red+black soil mixture.

And we saw two hundred here, well second-inning batting could have been difficult but the RCB bowlers are not that good at stopping their opponents.

A few Stats worked here:

1. RCB Bowlers let RR take the victory easily
2. Flatbed pitch no help for Spin led high score.

KKR vs LSG & KKR vs RR at Kolkata

The Pitch looked PATA, at Kolkata at both matches, the Day game between KKR & RR where we saw a huge score of 223 chased down by RR easily on this wicket.

In the night game KKR vs LSG, we saw a decent score of 161 chased down by KKR in just 15 overs. so no score is safe here full batting paradise pitch.

A few Stats worked here:

1. In the day game spinners get help but the pitch has no cracks for spinners so we saw a huge total
2. In the night game, the Pacers got help on this pitch when LSG was finding difficulty against the LAF bowler KKR did the same and Starc took 3 wickets.

MI vs RCB and MI Vs CSK at Mumbai

Nobody needs to tell more about this pitch the Wankhade Stadium won the toss and bowled the first wicket.

Huge Scores by any team even RCB scored 190+ in the first inning and we saw 3 fifties.

But in the CSK vs MI Match from the first picture even though the pitch was batting-friendly Pathirana’s bowling helped CSK to put pressure on MI.

A few Stats worked here:

1. Pacers do get help here especially the Yorker specialist like Bumrah & Pathirana
2. In the CSK vs MI match score was not that high but Pathirana took some important players out.
3. RCB lost batting first only because of their poor bowling.

RCB vs SRH at Benguluru

The Honeycomb Structure Pitch is a pure batting paradise where no even grass and big cracks for the spinners.

Black Soil PATA pitch where we saw the record-breaking 287 runs scored at this venue from SRH. RCB tried to chase down but the score was too big RCB lost it by just 20 runs.

DC vs SRH at Delhi

The black soil pitch with dry grass covering where Travis head and Abhishek Sharma broke the Powerplay record with 125 runs in 6 overs.

SRH scored 266 again with this batting pitch where no other team could have done this. The average team score imagined by others is max 210.

This happens when a fearless player bats in powerplay on a small ground and batting pitch.

PBKS vs CSK at Dharmashala

We see Multiple types of Pitches at this venue, black soil, Red Soil, with grass, without grass, batting-friendly, spin-friendly.

But we see a bounce, and turn at this pitch, the ground dimensions are quite similar to Bengaluru stadium we see 180-200 scores in the first inning.

Batters with Hitting ability in the Powerplay can be the key player if you see a batting-friendly wicket.

SRH vs LSG at Hyderabad

There are only 6 pitches in Hyderabad and this Pitch No. 2 was already used 2 times with a high score of 277 and 200+.

This time in the SRH vs LSG night game the pitch became batting-friendly in the second inning without a dew effect.

Or you could say SRH batting is dangerous at their home ground target of 165 chased by SRH with 10 wickets in hand in 9.4 overs.

Pitch Type and its Behaviour:

Based on the Mixture of Black Soil and Red Soil proportion we can see different types of Pitches, I will share some names given after looking at the pitch.

Basic Difference:- Red Soil pitch has High Bounce and good Turn, while Black Soil Pitch has Low bounce and Less Turn.

• Honeycomb Pitch – Pure Black Soil no grass (Less grass) you see cracks like honeycomb structure when looked closer “This is called a PATA pitch nothing for bowlers no swing no pace great pitch for batters, but some spinners might come in the game later in second inning.”
• White (Grey) Pitch – It’s a Hard Black Soil Pitch Relayed multiple times with water content same as the Honeycomb Pitch It is a Pata pitch and on this pitch you will not see any bowler help it’s a batting paradise pitch.
• White (Grey) Pitch with Grass – If you see some grass, especially at the good length of the pitch, then this might help the pacers in both innings with the new ball, while this pitch remains batting-friendly.
• Red Soil with Grass – A red color pitch with patchy grass is a bowling-friendly pitch especially bowling first, the pitch behaves very differently and the batsman gets confused because sometimes the ball comes nicely and sometimes it doesn’t. “Batting second on this pitch gives an advantage as this pitch gets slow after and the ball comes nicely to the bat so target chasing becomes easy.” But the Pacers can still be in the game due to grass till the first 6 to 8 overs.
• Red Soil with no grass – Batting Friendly but in the second inning, chasing on this pitch becomes easy, initially, the papers can get a bounce on this pitch and some wickets also but in the second inning, if you see no dew you can see some help for spinners otherwise pure batting friendly.

How to Identify Pitch Type?

Do not depend solely on listening to or reading the pitch report; you need to see the pitch with your own eyes to judge its nature. The major difference between a Red Soil pitch and a Black Soil pitch is the amount of grass present.

On a Red Soil pitch, the less black soil content there is, the less grass you will see on the pitch. If you see plain red soil without grass, similar to Mumbai Stadium, then you can predict how it will perform in the second innings.

Batting First Conditions:

Here are some batting first conditions, based on these conditions you can choose the players from batting first and blowing first teams.

• Weather:- If the day temperature is high, and the wind is flowing at the time of toss (or cloudy weather) then dew will not come in the second inning there is no advantage of chasing here.
• Pitch: If you see the pitch is batting-friendly is big enough to get catches in the second inning put runs on the board and use spinners later to put pressure.
• Team Strength – See the team strength if the bowlers can defend the given target then go for batting first.

Bowling First Conditions:

• Weather:- If the day temperature is high, and there is no windy condition at the time of toss then dew will come in the second inning making it batting-friendly in the second inning.
• Pitch:- If you see grass on the pitch and cloudy weather then the bowl can swing in the first inning go for bowling first and take early wickets.
• Team Strength:- If the batting line in the team is strong and can chase the given target, then trust your batters and go bowling first.

Here are some basic shared how captains choose batting or bowling first based on some conditions during the toss. You can assess whether the captain made the right decision and decide whether to follow their lead or make your own decision.

Based on the above information I hope you can build your team next time, just keep in mind the pitch report is not as it read you must see the pitch photo or video and then work accordingly also see the toss and why the captain chose to bat or bowl first.

All conditions include pitch, weather, and team strengths and weaknesses that’s it. Your team will be ready as a dream team with 1 or 2 team combinations only.