Fielding Flops

By Gulu Ezekiel

The biggest impact One-day cricket had on traditional cricket was to raise the all round standard of fielding.
Surprisingly though that raising of the bar does not appear to have crossed over to 20/20 cricket judging by recent evidence.
The second season of the IPL in South Africa saw the worst catching performance in an international tournament in years.
Many theories were put forward for the spate of dropped sitters, ranging from the intensely cold weather to the unusual natural lighting conditions prevalent in South Africa at the time.
It all culminated in the world record holder for most catches in Test cricket, Rahul Dravid flubbing a catch in the final that he would have taken with ease nine times out of ten.
The ongoing T-20 World Cup is only two days old at the time of writing. But the four matches so far have shown us some of the worst ground fielding in living memory.

The abysmal display by hosts England in their opener against the Netherlands was summed up by that horror of a final over by Stuart Broad.
The spearhead of the English bowling attack messed up three run out chances, including from the final ball of the match and also dropped an easy catch off his own bowling. It would have been hilarious if it had not been so pathetic.
Though the West Indies did well to beat Australia in their opening match, their fielding left much to be desired. Expert commentator Ian Chappell, not one to mince his words and one of the world’s greatest slip fielders in his day, could barely conceal his contempt as the Windies made a complete hash of things in the field.
It was no better when Bangladesh took on India. The Bangla fielders time and again missed the stumps and the wicket keeping was a disaster too. And who could believe Yuvraj Singh would floor the simplest of catches? That too just minutes after taking a blinder.