In an IPL season where it has rained sixes, it’s probably not surprising dropped catches have contributed to some of them. But not all of them were 50-50, precarious chances on the boundary ropes. Many catches have not only been tipped over the rope quite embarrassingly, some have been spilled after the fielder got all the time in the world to place himself under the ball. And not just Indians, overseas cricketers have to cop their fair share of the blame in what has been a forgettable season for captains and coaches alike.

Like on Tuesday, when Delhi Capitals’ Tristan Stubbs gave Rajasthan Royals’ Jos Buttler a reprieve in the early overs of an intense chase. Looking to slog Mukesh Kumar, Buttler ended up getting a leading edge towards point, where Stubbs, despite a considerable hang time on the ball, fluffed the catch while goimng at it with a reverse cup, and then again on his second attempt.

It’s another matter that Buttler was dismissed in the very next over but it could have easily gone sideways for Capitals like it did for RCB in April when Buttler hammered an unbeaten hundred after being dropped on six.

Till Tuesday, out of 657 catches offered, 146 were dropped, giving fielding sides a success percentage of 77.7%—the lowest so far in the last five IPL seasons and the second lowest ever. Only in the 2010 did the fielders do worse – they had a catching percentage of 76.8 that season. That the aggregate dropped catches are already level with all the past four seasons barring one (2022) with more than two weeks to go in this edition already points at a shambolic low. Luckily for some teams, the reprieves haven’t really dented their IPL standings.

Kolkata Knight Riders, who with a catching success% of 75.9 are seventh out of 10 teams, but are still topping the table. Lucknow Super Giants—the worst among all 10 with 70.5% catching success—however are faring worse.

Mumbai Indians haven’t had the best season till date but they have been pretty good in this category, with an efficiency of 82.4%. Still ahead, and unsurprisingly too, have been Chennai Super Kings (85.7%) where MS Dhoni has instilled a culture of having the best fielders at the most frequent catching positions.

While the ground fielding has been more or less par standard, quite a few Indian players—particularly the uncapped ones—have been guilty of dropping sitters in this IPL.

Catch conversion rates dipping during the 2020 and 2021 seasons were attributed to the rustiness in players emerging from Covid-forced breaks where they hardly could go out to train.

Three years down the line however, the problem seems to have engulfed every team. Most coaches can’t seem to put a finger on one particular reason behind this sudden surge of reprieves. Varun Chakaravarthy, who has dropped a few catches as well as seen a few being dropped off his own bowling, however offered a different take.

“What I can say is that it’s very humid out there and your fingers start to sweat, which didn’t happen last season. I am not going to give that as an excuse but we have to train more,” he said at a press conference in Kolkata last week.

Mohammed Kaif, one of the most agile fielders to have graced the game, however believes the intent is missing. “It is up to the coaches to make fielding enjoyable,” he said on Star Sports in April. “When we see them spending hours on batting and bowling, we generally give them the option of returning to the room to rest. They happily agree to avoid fielding.”

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