Lasith Malinga becomes 2nd Sri Lankan to claim hat-trick in T20Is

Malinga becomes 2nd Sri Lankan to claim hat-trick in T20Is

Lasith Malinga became the 5th bowler and 2nd from Sri Lanka to claim hat-trick in T20Is during the match between Sri Lanka and Bangladesh at R Premadasa Stadium, Colombo. Malinga did this during the first innings of the match in the 19th over of Bangladesh’s innings. The first two balls of the over went for three runs, while the next three resulted in three consecutive wickets. It started with wicketkeeper Mushfiqur Rahim’s wicket, who was clean bowled by Malinga for 15 off 6 balls attempting a slog sweep off a slower delivery and missing completely. Captain Mashrafe Mortaza, playing his last T20I match, tried to steer a ball on middle-stump and was bowled, once again off a slow delivery. And debutant Mehedi Hasan Miraz was trapped leg-before off his third straight, slow delivery.

Malinga also became the 2nd bowler to take 4 international hat-tricks. He already has 3 in ODIs. Wasim Akram is the only other one, with 2 in each of Tests and ODIs. Malinga became the 1st to take a T20I hat-trick without the help of a fielder. On the other hand, Mortaza became the 1st batsman to be a part of two hat-tricks as batsman. He was the part of first-ever hat-trick in T20Is, taken by Brett Lee in the 2007 World T20. Mehedi, on the other hand, became the 3rd Bangladeshi to be dismissed on golden duck on debut after Shamsur Rahman in 2013 and Mohammad Mithun in 2014.

April 6 seems to be lucky day for Malinga. As on the same day in 2014, Sri Lanka won the World T20 for the first time under the captaincy of — Malinga. Before Malinga, Thisara Perera was the only Sri Lankan on the list of T20I hat-tricks. Perera took hat-trick last year against India during the second T20I of the three-match series at Ranchi. The other three bowlers to do this are Lee, Jacob Oram and Tim Southee.

Despite that hat-trick, Bangladesh managed to post a decent total of 176 for 9. Besides Malinga, Nuwan Kulasekara, Vikum Sanjaya, Asela Gunaratne and Perera picked one wicket each.