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Many sports have a perfect scoring scenario. In darts it’s the nine-dart finish while snooker has its maximum 147 break. A perfect phenomenon in cricket would be the six ball, six wicket but has it ever been done?
What is a Six Ball Six Wicket?
This occurs when six wickets are taken in one over. It’s a perfect set of circumstances for the bowler with batters dismissed on every single delivery. As of August 2021, there hasn’t been a case of six wickets in an over in professional cricket. However, Australian club cricketer Aled Carey recently landed this feat.
Some observers might suggest that we could include six consecutive balls across two overs but that’s not really perfect. Ideally, six ball six wicket should relate to a single over.
Six Wickets in One Over
In 2017, Aled Carey began the over by having the batsman caught at slip. This was followed by a caught behind before he completed his hat trick with an LBW decision. Three clean bowled victims followed to finish the perfect over.
We’ve also seen this phenomenon in club cricket and schools cricket. Also in 2013, English schoolboy Luke Robinson took six wickets in six deliveries and all of his victims were clean bowled.
Who Took the Most Number of Wickets in One Over?
By August 2021, there had been three instances of bowlers claiming five wickets in an over. These include records across all three main formats of the game. New Zealand international Neil Wagner was the first of these with five victims for Otago against Wellington in April 2011.
In 2013 in Bangladesh, Al-Amin Hossain took six wickets in an over for UCB-BCB XI against Abahani Ltd. Completing the trio is Abhimanyu Mithun who was playing for Karnataka against Haryana in 2019.
Wagner and Hossain’s overs featured six legitimate deliveries while Mithun’s over included seven balls as it contained a wide.
It’s worth mentioning two other performances: Sri Lanka’s Lasith Malinga is the only player to have taken four wickets in four balls twice.
Another great feat was claimed by Surrey’s Pat Pocock in 1972. The spinner also claimed four in four balls and went on to get seven wickets in 11 deliveries which remains a record to this day.
What is a Hat Trick in Cricket?
A hat trick occurs when a bowler takes three wickets in three consecutive deliveries. There have been many instances where this has happened, both in test matches, first class and limited overs cricket. We’ve covered this and some historic hat tricks previously.
However, no player has yet taken six wickets in six balls, either in a single over or in six consecutive deliveries.
