If I could hold the catch, it would have been a different story – Litton Das on the 3rd ODI
Shane McDermott admitted the need to get his players to absorb ‘pressure’ when it came to catching at the international level while Litton Das spilled a regulation chance to send Virat Kohli packing for only 1 run when he flicked uppishly towards the fielder at short midwicket.
Even as Bangladesh celebrated a remarkable home series win over India, the result in the final ODI in Chattogram where India won by a mammoth 227 runs put the spotlight on their recent slump in catching accuracy.
However, in the seventh over of India’s innings in the third ODI, Litton Das spilled a regulation chance to send Virat Kohli packing for only 1 run when he flicked uppishly towards the fielder at short midwicket.
“My catch (drop) was a costly one,”
Litton admitted in the post-match press conference.
“If I could hold the catch it would have been a different story.”
Bangladesh fielding coach Shane McDermott admitted the need to get his players to absorb ‘pressure’ when it came to catching at the international level.
“The biggest transition from domestic, Academy or A team cricket to international cricket is the word called pressure. My greatest challenge is to get the players to understand what pressure is,”
McDermott said.
“In my opinion, it is the element of fear of failure or self-doubt in your ability. Trying to educate the players on what “pressure” actually looks like is one of our greatest focus areas. Then we have to challenge the players to commit a little bit more when things are not going the way we like them. We want them to be courageous. The coaching group is trying to take the pressure away from the players,”
he added.
“Talking about the fear factor, we think about potentially what are the repercussions of dropping a catch when the ball is in the air. We see a lot of high balls dropped under lights because fielders have time to think. Trying to train what we think when the ball is in the air, is a very hard task. But it can be learned.
“When we drop catches under lights in critical moments, we create one of the greatest learning experiences. When the player walks off the ground, hopefully having won the game, we can easily say to them that look, catches don’t lose matches. It is a fact. It happens quite regularly. It is a part of the game. Obviously, we want to drop as few catches as possible. As a team, if we drop a catch, our support staff and our team are gelling together really well. We are trying to keep everyone’s spirits high,”
he said.
“Our senior players have fielded well for the last 15 years. We just have to manage their confidence. We also have younger players who haven’t fielded at the intensity level of the other night [2nd ODI]. Every player is different,”
he said.
“There’ll be days Shakib will spend half an hour fielding, and days when he feels he doesn’t need to. It is important to manage the player from day to day. We demand the younger players do a bit extra. They haven’t done the time that the senior players have,”
he added.