Afghanistan leg-spinner Rashid Khan took four wickets with four consecutive deliveries in Sunday’s Twenty20 International against Ireland in Dehradun.
Khan removed quartet Kevin O’Brien, George Dockrell, Shane Getkate and Simi Singh en route to final figures of five for 27 in Afghanistan’s 32-run triumph.
This is the first time the feat has been achieved in T20I cricket. Sri Lankan fast bowler did it in ODI competition against South Africa during the 2007 World Cup in the Caribbean, where all-rounders Shaun Pollock, Andrew Hall and Jacques Kallis – and tail-ender Makhaya Ntini – were the victims.
No bowler has taken four wickets with consecutive deliveries in Test cricket.
- Pollock did in List A competition for Warwickshire against Leicestershire in April 1996’s Benson & Hedges Cup clash at Edgbaston in Birmingham, where middle-order batsmen James Whitaker and Phil Robinson followed openers Vince Wells and Greg MacMillan’s successive departures.
‘I’m very pleased. If someone had told me I would take six wickets with a hat-trick in my first game for Warwickshire I would have laughed at them,’ Pollock told The Independent at the time.
‘That first wicket in my second over helped to calm me down. I had a few nerves to start with, playing for my new county, but I was happy with the pitch which seemed to do a bit, although this sort of thing isn’t going to happen all the time.’
- Eastern Province’s Kelly Smuts and the Cape Cobras’ Charl Willoughby snared four in four – in first-class cricket – against Boland in Paarl and the Dolphins in Durban respectively.
Photo: Getty
