15 BLOWS THAT TOOK THE SERIES AWAY

England drop less, pay more

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Parthiv Patel was India's worst fielder followed by Virat Kohli, who dropped four catches. © Cricbuzz

"Our catching is still below par - I think the last three catches we've dropped have only cost us 500!"

Trevor Bayliss, the England coach, grumbled after Day Four of the fifth and final Test in Chennai, arguably their worst day of the tour. He was pointing to skipper Alastair Cook's drop off Karun Nair, when on 34, who went on to score an unbeaten 303 - the second highest individual score on Indian soil. In the previous Test in Mumbai, the visitors dropped Virat Kohli and Jayant Yadav while Murali Vijay got away with a stumping chance and the three went on to score centuries. The catching from the home side also left a lot to be desired and here's a look on the chances 'grassed' by either team in the series.

Catches dropped by India

+ Cost = Final score - Score at which the batsman was dropped for the first time in the innings

Catches dropped by England

Considering the dropped chances, prima facie India have dropped 20 to England's 15. However, the average cost per drop for the home side was only 44.50 in comparison to 59.07 runs per drop for the visitors. Three of India's batsmen scored more than 100 after getting a life while Jayant Yadav added 96 en route his maiden Test century in Mumbai. On the other hand, two England players scored a century after getting dropped on naught - Keaton Jennings in Mumbai and Moeen Ali in Chennai.

Cook and Jonny Bairstow were the biggest beneficiaries, getting dropped not less than five times each. In fact, Cook was dropped just three balls into the series by Ajinkya Rahane, the man who holds the record for most catches in a Test match, at gully of Mohammed Shami. Bairstow was the only one to get three reprieves in one innings - England's second innings in Mumbai. Incidentally, these two head the list of fielders who grassed most for the visitors - three each - including the costliest drop of the series, that of Nair mentioned above.

Among Indian batsmen, Vijay got three new lease of lives while Kohli, Pujara, Nair and Jayant all got two each. Among the 12 players who featured in all the five games, only Adil Rashid and Ravindra Jadeja never got a second life. Kohli made more runs than anyone else after getting dropped - 278 runs after two drops - Rashid being the culprit on both instances.

Talking about bowlers, the leading wicket taker of the series Ashwin was also the unluckiest one. Seven chances were dropped off his bowling followed by five off Ben Stokes and four off Umesh Yadav. Bairstow got dropped four times off Ashwin while Cook was given let offs of the bowling of Shami thrice.

Parthiv Patel was easily the worst in the field from either side, even if we leave the missed stumpings out, putting down as many as seven chances despite playing just three off the five Tests. Four of these came off Ashwin making them the worst bowler-fielder combo. In three of these instances the batsmen getting benefited was Bairstow. For England, all three drops from Bairstow came off the bowling of Stokes making them their worst combination on the field despite averaging 64.80 per partnership while batting. Kohli was the next worst fielder grassing four but none of the drops cost more than 38 runs.

As many as 11 catches were dropped in the first Test in Rajkot including five off England's first innings - the most in any single innings. Mohali saw 10 chances being put down, four each by either sides in their respective first innings. The second Test in Vizag had the fewest number of drops - three.

Adil Rashid dropped Kohli twice and the India captain went on to make the most of it by scoring 278 runs. ©Reuters

© Cricbuzz

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