Rain drops put paid to MS Dhoni's hopes of restoring parity in the hard-fought ODI series in his hometown on Wednesday. Thank heavens they did, otherwise catch drops could have made eventually winning the series extremely difficult.

01 / 8

Rain drops put paid to MS Dhoni's hopes of restoring parity in the hard-fought ODI series in his hometown on Wednesday. Thank heavens they did, otherwise catch drops could have made eventually winning the series extremely difficult. (PTI)

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02 / 8

Dhoni won the toss and elected to field in the afternoon but not much went his way after that. (PTI)

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03 / 8

Australia piled up 295 for eight, riding captain George Bailey (98) and Glenn Maxwell's (92) heroics. But that would not have been possible without half-a-dozen drops. (PTI)

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04 / 8

It did not matter in the end as the match was abandoned after a heavy rain stopped proceedings five overs into India's innings with the scoreboard reading 27 without loss. The match was finally called off after an inspection at 8.35 pm. (PTI)

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05 / 8

But the performance in this aborted game will not let Dhoni and Duncan Fletcher sleep tight. Team India, which just a few days back looked like an invincible fort, has developed pores in its walls. Plug a couple, you will see some more. Till Wednesday, pace bowling was the headache and to address the issue, the team management finally dropped Ishant Sharma despite publicly backing him day in and day out since the Mohali massacre. (PTI)

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06 / 8

In addition, it dropped Bhuvneshwar Kumar, the bowler who had been most economical so far. Their replacements, Shami Ahmed and Jaidev Unadkat, came up trumps but fielders spoilt a lot of their good work. Pacer Ahmed (3/42) ran through the Aussie top-order but dropped catches meant Bailey and Maxwell could take Australia to a position where they could once again think of a 300-plus total. (PTI)

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07 / 8

That it did not happen was more due to some bad shots by the duo and birthday boy Brad Haddin (3). Their wickets between the 38th and the 40th over put paid to the hopes of a bigger total. Bailey edged his very first ball to third slip but the otherwise reliable Virat Kohli dropped it, marking the first of many drops. (PTI)

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08 / 8

The Bailey-Maxwell repair job later in the innings could have been ended earlier had Ashwin not dropped Bailey on 35 or Yuvraj not dropped a half-chance of Maxwell when he was on 45. Even captain Dhoni grassed Maxwell's late-cut a little later. (PTI)

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