A dropped catch is often the difference between lifting the World Cup and going home empty-handed, a fact which has not been lost on

’s India. The Men in Blue have dropped just one catch in the tournament so far, and hung on to 14 — the best among all teams.

KL Rahul’s dropped catch against Pakistan, off

’s bowling, is the only blip so far.

The worst catching side are Pakistan, who have dropped a total of 14 chances, or 35% of their catching opportunities so far in this Cup!

The second worst are, unexpectedly, hosts England, who have dropped 12 (before Tuesday’s Australia-England game).

Also unexpectedly, New Zealand have let nine chances go abegging.

India have put in some smart work of late to improve their percentage of successful chances, as fielding coach R Sridhar revealed recently. “We have this points system where we grade catches. Grade one is a straightforward catch that comes to you and earns you one point. Grade two, which gets you two points, is where the fielder needs to move and is under pressure. Grade three is a half-chance — nobody will complain if you don’t take it, but if you do, it’s a game changer. You get four points for a grade three catch. If you drop a straightforward catch, you lose two points. If you drop a grade two, you lose one point from the series kitty. No points are deducted for dropping grade three catches,” Sridhar told website Cricinfo.

India’s 5 main parameters to assess fielders’ quality

India have developed five main parameters for assessing a fielder’s quality — interception (clean, fumble, misfield); throws (good, direct hit, off target); catches (grade one, two, three); run-outs (direct hits or run-outs with assists) and runs (saved, given). This data is used to calculate the net productivity of a player.

The methodology, coupled with an increased emphasis on fitness, seems to have paid off for India.