Ranji Trophy 2024-25: Shardul Thakur registers his maiden hat-trick in first-class cricket against Meghalaya

The last round of the league stage of the ongoing Ranji Trophy 2024-25 has begun and this will be the moment when teams for the knockouts will be decided. One of the sides that was going into the tournament as favourites is Mumbai and the player who has been making waves right now is Shardul Thakur. The 33-year-old scored an incredible century and a half century against Jammu and Kashmir in a losing cause in the previous match.

The last game the Mumbai team are playing is against Meghalaya who have not won a single match in the tournament so far. This is where Shardul Thakur shined once again for the Mumbai team and it was with the ball this time. Shardul started proceedings for the Mumbai team with the new ball and put the Meghalaya batters under pressure, taking four wickets early into his spell and playing a major role in dismissing half of the Meghalaya side early. 

In this spell, Shardul also entered the record books where after getting a breakthrough in his first over, he came back in the third over to claim his first hat-trick in first-class cricket. It was the last three balls of the third over of the match where all the drama happened as Shardul dismissed Balchander Anirudh for a three-ball duck, followed by middle order batters Sumit Kumar and Jaskirat Singh off the next two deliveries respectively and became only the fifth Mumbai bowler to register a hat-trick in the Ranji Trophy. Meanwhile, the last bowler to take a hat-trick from the team was Royston Dias who achieved this feat against Bihar in the 2023-24 season.

Speaking of the match, at the time of writing Meghalaya’s innings did not see much improvement and they were bowled out for 86. The seam attack of Shardul, Mohit Avasthi, and Sylvester Dsouza created havoc on the Meghalaya batters in this match. 

Also Read - Watch: Fan breaches security to touch Virat Kohli's feet in Ranji Trophy 2024-25

Shardul hopeful of Mumbai’s qualification 

Thakur made it clear on the eve of the match that it has been a bit of a hot and cold season for the Mumbai team in the red-ball format and talked about the message by the coaches and management of sticking together as a team. 

“Longer format is an emotional roller coaster ride, one session can take the game away. The player who has observed must have learned from it. Be humble and be respectful, I don’t take anything or anyone lightly. The message from the coach and captain is simple. We need to stick together and play together as a team,” Thakur said as quoted by The Indian Express.