"The grounds that I have seen are beautiful and they have gorgeous facilities, but the wickets are not up to the standard of the ICC," Chappell says.

Peter Simunovich

With the name Chappell, Chris Chappell just had to be involved in cricket. He is not related to the Australian cricket brothers - Ian, Greg and Trevor - but he played against Ian and Greg when the Australian team played against Toronto Cricket Club in Canada in an exhibition game in 1975.

He hit it off with the Chappells and remains in touch with Ian with the occasional telephone conversation about their mutual love - cricket.

Chappell, 53, still plays about 10 games a season in 20/20 games with Toronto, a team he has been associated with since he was six years old. He represented Canada in the 1979 World Cup and played against Australia, England and Pakistan as a top order batsman.

Since 1996 he has worked on and off as a curator and in that time he has helped install 15 turf squares and between 40 and 45 turf wickets. He has also played on turf pitches in England, Bermuda, Barbados, Nassau, Jamaica and Los Angeles.

Chappell knows a thing or two about the game.

And with his experience as a player and later as a curator he says that a lot of the US turf pitches that he has seen are not up to International Cricket conference (ICC) standard.

"The grounds that I have seen are beautiful and they have gorgeous facilities, but the wickets are not up to the standard of the ICC," he said. "The problem is that the three soils - clay, sand and silt - that are used to make a pitch are not binding.

"This causes the wicket to break up and it is good for spinners, it takes turn and has an uneven bounce."

Chappell says the US has the right soil to make a proper pitch to reach ICC standards.

"You need to do research, testing, testing and more testing until you find the soil that is right," he said.

The perfect pitch, says Chappell, should have about 45 percent clay, 30 percent silt and 25 percent sand. This, he says, would give the wicket consistent bounce throughout a match. He added: "It will be lively for a couple of days and later on there will some zip off the seam."

Chappell said he was available to help US and Canada cricket administrators to bring their turf wickets up to a level that is acceptable by the ICC.

"I would like to see US cricket move forward and now is the opportunity to do that," he said. "I love the game and have been involved with it for a long time and I want to give something back."

Chappell, to underline his knowledge about fields, studied a short course in turf management at the University of Guelph in Guelph, Ontario, several years ago where he attended classes every day for a month as he tried to learn more about his grounds and how to keep them in top shape.

Now he is working on an assignment with 30 turf pitches on five fields on 20 acres in Morgan Hill , which is south of San Jose, California. The main field will have 10 wickets in a center square while another four fields will have five pitches each.

By the way, Chappell said that the fields, in his opinion, will be made up with the right combination of clay, sand and silt.

"We have run 21 tests on the soil and have come up with soil reasonably local to the area," he said.