The 20 wickets are the most taken on any day of a Test match in Australia since 1951, when 22 fell on the opening day of the Adelaide Oval Test against West Indies.
Former England captain Michael Vaughan led the criticism, but Michael Neser and his fast-bowling counterpart Josh Tongue predictably gave the pitch the thumbs-up.
"This first-day wicket is a shocker. It really is," Vaughan said on Fox Sports.
Neser, who took four wickets on Friday, was asked if the day-one pitch did too much.
"I'm a bowler, so no," he said with a grin.
"You're going to get an array of wickets, going around Australia.
"Finding that right combination of bat and ball - you can't judge a wicket until the end of the game."
Similarly, Tongue was seeing no demons in the pitch after he snared five wickets.
"If you get the ball in the right areas, which I felt like we did today as a bowling unit, you're going to get your rewards," he said.
The spectre of another two-day Test in this series loomed large at stumps on Friday - nightwatchman Scott Boland hit a boundary off the last ball of the day to leave Australia 0-4 in their second innings.
After England won the toss, they blasted Australia out for 152, but then were destroyed themselves for 110.
Cricket Australia lost millions of dollars in revenue when the first Test in Perth did not reach day three.
But Neser said the pitch could change dramatically for day two and be much more batter-friendly.
The flurry of wickets meant debate over the pitch completely eclipsed talk earlier on day one about Australia going into the game without a front-line spin bowler.
Vaughan's compatriot Stuart Broad was similarly non-plussed as England followed Australia's batting collapse with an even worse first-innings performance.
"The pitch is doing too much if I'm perfectly honest," Broad told SEN.
Brett Lee and fellow Fox Sports commentator Alyssa Healy were divided on whether the pitch was offering too much.
"l use the word 'sporty', and I've often said, look, it's a batsman's game, we're here to see batsmen score runs, but l think it's a bit too sporty in my opinion," Lee said.
"I think there's a little bit too much in it."
Healy, whose husband Mitchell Starc led the demolition of England's top order, was rapt.
"I personally like it ... it's a hot topic of conversation in our household, it's never how good the bowling is, it's always about how bad the batting is when we talk about the wicket,'' she said.
"But sometimes the bowling is just too good."
Earlier on Friday, TV commentator and former Test legspinner Kerry O'Keeffe was defiant after Australia had gone with an all-pace attack.
"Spinners are cockroaches, you just can't kill us," he said on Kayo Sports.
"We're like Ringo Starr in The Beatles, we're the worst singer, but you need us to blend in."
In no small part because of the ample displays of legspin genius he produced at the MCG, the Southern Stand was renamed in Shane Warne's honour.
Since Warne took his 700th Test wicket in the 2006 Boxing Day Test, Australia had always played a spin bowler at the MCG.
But with Nathan Lyon sidelined because of a hamstring injury, this is the third time in five Tests that Australia have not featured a full-time spin bowler.
BOXING DAY WICKET FRENZY AT THE MCG
* The 20 wickets are the most on any day of a Test in Australia since 1951
* The most in a day was 27 - the 1888 Ashes Test at Lord's
* Friday was the most wickets in a day at an MCG Boxing Day Test, eclipsing 18 in the 1998 Ashes series
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