Top 4 dropped catches in matches involving India

MS Dhoni went on to score an unbeaten 87 against Australia during the series decider in Melbourne, guiding India to clinch the series 2-1. As famously quoted by the cricket adage, “Catches win matches,” Australia let the third ODI slip from their grasp by their unimpressive fielding.

Dhoni also survived two chances when he was dropped on 0 and 74 by Glenn Maxwell and Aaron Finch respectively off the bowling of Marcus Stoinis on both the occasions.

Team India has been involved in plenty of such occasions, where they have been on either side of the coin, i.e. benefitted of the dropped chance or have been at the receiving end of significant consequences of a dropped catch.

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#1 Rohit Sharma’s 264 against Srilanka

Rohit Sharma during his world record innings of 264 against Srilanka at Eden Gardens, the highest individual score by a batsman in ODIs, made the complete use of the lifeline given to him. While batting on the score of just 4 runs, he was dropped by Thisara Perera off the bowling of Shaminda Eranga.

Rohit Sharma was dropped early on way to his record-breaking 264

India went on to put a massive score of 404 for loss of 5 wickets and went to win the match by a margin of 153 runs bundling out Srilanka for 251 runs.

#2 Karun Nair’s Triple Century

Karun Nair, while scoring an unbeaten 303 against England at Chepauk, becoming the second Indian after Virender Sehwag to score a triple century in Test cricket.

Nair is India's only second triple-centurion in Test cricket

Alastair Cook, and on 217 by current skipper Joe Root off the bowling of Jake Ball on both the occasions.

Well, it is often said, “luck favors the brave,” thus Nair survived plenty of times by way of missed catches and stumpings.

England went on to lose the five-match series 4-0.

#3 Sachin Tendulkar’s highest Test score

The Little Master while scoring his 34th Test century, equaling the then record of most Test centuries with Sunil Gavaskar, had plenty of chances going on his way. The match played against Bangladesh at Dhaka saw Sachin Tendulkar being given a lifeline when he was yet to open his account, thanks to a dropped catch by Mohammad Ashraful of the bowling of Mashrafe Mortaza.

Tendulkar received some lucky breaks on his way to his highest Test score

With a couple of more catches going down from hands of Habibul Bashar and Rajin Saleh, Sachin went on to make a magnificent hundred and thereby achieving parity with Gavaskar’s record. India went on to win the match by an innings and 140 runs.

Sachin remained unbeaten on 248, his highest Test score which remained the same until he hung his boots. In a career spreading over two decades, Sachin went on to score 51 centuries to his tally.

#4 The Graham Gooch and Kiran More saga

During India’s tour of England in 1990, in a period where India was not a good touring side, a dropped chance remains as a moment of history until today. During the first Test match at Lord’s. the then captain of England Team Graham Gooch went on to make 333 runs after he was dropped by Indian wicket-keeper Kiran More on 36 off the bowling of Sanjeev Sharma.

Graham Gooch was on just 36 when he was dropped. He went on to score 333.

This match also included Mohammad Azharuddin’s one session hundred and Kapil Dev’s four sixes off the four balls of Eddie Hemmings to avoid the follow-on.

Gooch continued his performance in 2nd innings also and scored 123 runs before falling to Sanjeev Sharma only. India went on to lose the match by 247 runs and the English won the Test series1-0 with two drawn matches in the next two encounters.

The drop may have not only cost India the match and the series, but also the career of Sanjeev Sharma. He never went on wear the Test whites for India again. There are many more such instances which cost a team badly, and some of them go down in the history books as the case of Kiran More’s drop.