Irfan Pathan produced one of the best hattricks for India in test cricket. It was an amazing performance by the all-rounder who took advantage of good bowling conditions. India and Pakistan played in the 3rd test match at Karachi from 29th January to 1st February 2006.
Indian captain Rahul Dravid won the toss and elected to field first. Irfan Pathan bowled the first over. He dismissed opener Salman Butt off the 4th ball with the good catch from Rahul Dravid at slips. He bowled a great inswinger to Younis Khan dismissing him LBW. On the 6th ball, Pathan dismissed Mohammed Yousuf with another great delivery and bowled him. He became the fourth Indian to take a hattrick in international cricket.
He bowled with great control on good bowling conditions which made the life tough for top 3 Pakistani batsmen. Despite his hattrick performance, Pathan finished with figures of 5/61 in 17.1 overs. Pakistan scored 245 with contributions from Kamran Akmal 113, Abdul Razzaq and Shoaib Akhtar 45 each. India lost that match by a massive 341 runs.
Irfan Pathan has a total of 29 test matches, 120 One day International matches for team India. He took 100 wickets in those 29 matches and 173 wickets in ODI matches. His first test match came against Australia on 9th January 2003. Pathan was a part of the team which won inaugural T20 World Cup held in South Africa which team India won under the captaincy of young MS Dhoni.
He was a decent all-rounder who could bat lower down the order with quick-fire knocks. Due to injuries, Irfan Pathan has been not a part of limited overs side for quite some time. India needed a genuine all-rounder after Kapil Dev and did a decent job. He scored 1105 runs in test matches with 1 century and 9 half centuries while in ODI cricket, the all-rounder made 1544 runs in ODI cricket with 5 half-centuries to his name.
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