“Catches win matches” (cricket adage)

“Catches win matches” (or “catches make matches”) is a popular adage in the game of cricket. “Catches win matches” has been cited in print since at least 1953.
 
   
Wikipedia: Cricket
Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of 11 players on an oval-shaped field, at the centre of which is a rectangular 22-yard long pitch. One team bats, trying to score as many runs as possible while the other team bowls and fields, trying to dismiss the batsmen and thus limit the runs scored by the batting team. A run is scored by the striking batsman hitting the ball with his bat, running to the opposite end of the pitch and touching the crease there without being dismissed. The teams switch between batting and fielding at the end of an innings.
 
27 June 1953, The Gleaner (Kingston, Jamaica), “Epidemic of Dropped Catches,” pg. 10, col. 1:
If catches win matches, then England have thrown their opportunity away.
       
28 January 1955, The Gleaner (Kingston, Jamaica), “Colts Should Shine Against Trinidad,” pg. 12, col. 7:
Catches win matches and runs saved in the field are as good as runs on the board.
 
Google Books
The Testing Years:
The story of England’s rise to the top in post-war cricket
By Gordon Ross
London: S. Paul
1958
Pg. ?:
The bowlers had good reason for being pretty fed up; catches win matches; dropped catches lose them.
 
Google Books
Cricket Is a Game
By Colin McCool
London: S. Paul
1961
Pg. ?:
If catches win matches — and they do — the one Don Tallon took off my bowling in the Second Test at Sydney was good enough to have swung a series.
 
Google Books
A History of Cricket
By Gordon Ross
London: Barker
1972
Pg. 56:
Catches win matches ...
 
OCLC WorldCat record
Girl in goal ; and, Catches win matches.
Author: Rob Childs
Publisher: Cambridge University Press, 1991.
Edition/Format:  Book : Fiction : Juvenile audience : English
 
Google Books
Cricket for Dummies
By Julian Knight
Milton, Qld.: Wiley Publishing Australia
2006
Pg. 132:
One of the most famous sayings in cricket is ‘Catches win matches’. Quite often, the team that drops the fewest catches in a match is triumphant.