The Lord’s slope and how it affects batting and bowling at the home of cricket

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There is nowhere quite like Lord’s, the self-styled home of cricket, with its unique atmosphere and glorious mix of the traditional and the modern.

But there is one quirky constant at the world’s most famous cricket ground — it is not a stadium — that has been there since a former bowler by the name of Thomas Lord created a home in St John’s Wood, just north of central London, for the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) in 1814.

For Lord’s has never provided a level playing field for Test cricket, and the England and India teams who will take to the pristine outfield to begin the third of a five-Test series on Thursday will have to contend with an unusual characteristic at this quintessential English ground.

A slope.

Not just any old slope, but one that drops fully 2.5 metres (8ft 2in) from the Grandstand on the north side of the ground across to the Tavern and Mound Stands to the south — the advertising hoardings in the lead image on this article show the gradient perfectly. And it is one that has provided a perennial challenge for batters, bowlers and wicketkeepers alike.

Nobody knows more about the unique demands of the slope than former England bowler and Middlesex stalwart Angus Fraser, who played 96 first-class matches at Lord’s after making his debut in 1984, including five Tests, and 128 limited-overs ‘List A’ games, one of them a one-day international.

The north-to-south slope shown from The Athletic’s seat in the Lord’s media centre facing the Pavilion End (Paul Newman/The Athletic)

In all, Fraser bowled 25,864 balls at Lord’s, most of them from the western Pavilion End, where the ball goes down the slope towards right-handed batters, before retiring in 2002, coping with it so well he took 463 wickets. To him, the Lord’s slope was home.

“It’s pretty obvious that if you were building a cricket ground from scratch, you wouldn’t have a slope like this,” Fraser tells The Athletic.

“But it’s something that’s there because it’s been the nature of that piece of land for thousands of years. It flows down from Hampstead Heath (the city’s highest point at 139m/456ft above sea level) into central London and eventually ends up in the River Thames.

“It’s pretty unique. Grounds in most other countries are newer and pretty flat, but there are similar things on other English cricket grounds. You run down a hill from the Kirkstall Lane End at Headingley (in Leeds), and there’s a bit of a slope downhill at (Nottingham’s) Trent Bridge, but I can’t think of a slope like Lord’s across the ground.”

Lord’s has had more than 200 years to correct the anomaly at a ground whose owners at the MCC, the guardians of Lord’s and the very spirit of the sport, take meticulous care over just about every other detail. So, why have they not sorted it out by now?

Fraser bowling against Australia in 1998 (William West/AFP via Getty Images)

“To reposition it, you’d have to dig half of the ground up and build up the stands, but that’s not something MCC have ever wanted to do,” says Fraser, now director of Middlesex in the Community charity arm. “They want it to be part of the charm of the ground.

“But it does create problems for ground staff because water flows downhill. How do you stop it? Keeping the square dry is always an issue because water gets under the covers. That can interfere with the pitch, and in the old days it used to flood in front of the Tavern Stand when it rained heavily, but now they have an unbelievable drainage system and you get back out there far quicker than you ever used to.”

In case you’re wondering which way the slope runs at Lord’s… #ENGvSA pic.twitter.com/EXkmcPYjsn

— Melinda Farrell (@melindafarrell) August 17, 2022

How about the challenges for the cricketers themselves? A 2.5 metre slope can be disconcerting for bowlers and batters and requires a certain adjustment.

“When you have a slope, even a round ball lands on something that’s angled and there’s going to be some extra movement,” says Fraser. “The slope does give the bowler something to work with, and that’s one of the reasons why, historically, scores at Lord’s have not been quite as high. It can be a perfect batting pitch, but the ball will naturally move slightly when it hits the surface.

“(But) It can also cause the bowler problems. If you bowl well, you can really use the slope to your advantage, but if you’re struggling, it can highlight your shortcomings.

“I bowled from the Pavilion End predominantly, and in my time, there were far more right-handed batters than left. That end has always been the best for bowlers who can bowl a consistent line. I was a good bowler but not as good as Glenn McGrath, Jimmy Anderson and Curtly Ambrose, and they all preferred the Pavilion End.

“If you’re batting at the Nursery End (so facing the bowling from the Pavilion End), the slope is running down from your right, so you’re expecting the ball to nip back down that slope and leaving the ball becomes a challenge. You’re not leaving with confidence. I remember Alec Stewart being bowled by McGrath in an Ashes Test when he was leaving the ball, and if that happens every now and then, a batter can get really nervous about where their off-stump is.

McGrath bowls Stewart out in 1997 – the Australia bowler had great success at Lord’s (Paul Vicente/AFP via Getty Images)

“They then push at balls and the slips come into the game. So if a bowler from the Pavilion End can get their line right and they’re bowling two or three inches outside off-stump, the batter will be thinking, ‘Do I play at it or can I leave it?’. They end up pushing at it tentatively rather than with total commitment.

“Then again, as a bowler, if you get too straight, everything will go down legside and you just get picked off. Or you can be too wide and it’s out there to be cut or driven. That’s why it rewards good, accurate bowlers.”

Not every bowler likes to run in with the historic Lord’s pavilion at their back.

“Bowling from the Nursery End to right-handers suits away swingers,” says Fraser. “But the ball is unlikely to go up the slope once it’s pitched and therefore if you bowl three or four inches outside off-stump, a right-handed batter can leave it with confidence.”

Current England Test captain Ben Stokes is one player who prefers bowling from the Nursery End because he says it helps the jump in his delivery stride.

“It’s one of those things where I’ve played here loads of times and have come to terms with it. It’s just something to get used to,” Stokes said at Wednesday’s pre-match media session. “It’s like at Headingley, when you first bowl up or down the hill. Get through your first two balls up the hill and you’re fine.”

Akash Deep, the destroyer of England in last week’s second Test at Edgbaston, and Washington Sundar of India’s expected third Test attack have not played international cricket at Lord’s before, and Fraser believes that may be a factor in the home side’s favour.

“You get better bowling at Lord’s with experience and it can be disconcerting if you haven’t bowled there before,” he says. “There was the case of Scott Boswell (in the 2001 final of the C&G Trophy one-day tournament, he bowled eight wides in a single over for Leicestershire against Somerset), which might have been nerves, but the slope made the issue bigger.”

The slope can even be a problem for a dismissed batter simply walking back to the pavilion.

“It’s sad to recall this because we have just lost him, but something funny happened to ‘Syd’ Lawrence (the former England bowler who passed away last month),” says Fraser.

“He was playing against Middlesex for Gloucestershire and got out to a poor shot at an important time. He was devastated and put his head down to walk towards the gate in the middle of the pavilion. But he ended up in front of the committee room because the slope just took him down there.

“But I’ve bowled more overs at Lord’s than most, certainly seamers, and I loved bowling at Lord’s. There really is no place like it. And that includes the slope.”

(Top photo: Stu Forster/Getty Images)

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