Cricket World Cup: List of tournament hat-tricks

Taking a hat-trick in a Cricket World Cup match is a pretty rare achievement and is a feat which has only been achieved nine times in the history of the competition.

India’s Chetan Sharma was the first bowler to take three wickets with consecutive deliveries back in 1987, with South Africa all-rounder JP Duminy the last player to take a hat-trick in 2015.

Ahead of October’s 2023 Cricket World Cup in India, we take a look at the nine hat-tricks to have been achieved in the tournament to date.

BOWLER	TEAM	OPPOSITION	YEAR
Chetan Sharma	India	New Zealand	1987
Saqlain Mushtaq	Pakistan	Zimbabwe	1989
Chaminda Vaas	Sri Lanka	Bangladesh	2003
Brett Lee	Australia	Kenya	2003
Lasith Malinga	Sri Lanka	South Africa	2007
Kemar Roach	West Indies	Netherlands	2011
Lasith Malinga	Sri Lanka	Kenya	2011
Steven Finn	England	Australia	2015
JP Duminy	South Africa	Sri Lanka	2015

Chetan Sharma (1987)

Chetan Sharma claimed the honour of being the first bowler to take a hat-trick at the World Cup.

The India quick’s feat came at the fourth staging of the competition, during a group game against New Zealand in Nagpur.

Ken Rutherford, Ian Smith and Ewen Chatfield were all clean bowled by Sharma and it’s a record that will stay with the Indian bowler.

Saqlain Mushtaq (1999)

It took 12 long years for a second World Cup hat-trick to be achieved and it was Saqlain Mushtaq who delivered the goods.

Zimbabwe’s Pommie Mbangwa was trapped lbw by the Pakistan off-spinner to bring up the treble and finish the contest at The Oval, with Henry Olonga and Adam Huckle having gone to the previous two deliveries.

Chaminda Vaas (2003)

Sri Lanka faced Bangladesh in the 2003 World Cup and it was a pretty remarkable start to the match, as left-armer Chaminda Vaas took a hat-trick with the first three balls of the match

The paceman dismissed Hannan Sarkar, Mohammad Ashraful and Ehsanul Haque, who edged the hat-trick ball to Mahela Jayawardene at slip.

Brett Lee (2003)

Australia's Brett Lee was the second bowler to land the hat-trick in the 2003 World Cup.

The right-arm quick dismissed Kennedy Otieno, Brijal Patel and David Obuya to leave Kenya 3-3, with the hat-trick ball an almost unplayable 96.6mph yorker.

Lee had a reputation as one of the fastest bowlers in world cricket and his performance against Kenya did little to dispel that belief.

Lasith Malinga (2007)

Sri Lanka’s unorthodox genius Lasith Malinga is the only player to have taken two World Cup hat-tricks and the first of those came against South Africa in 2007.

Malinga beat Shaun Pollock, Andrew Hall and Jacques Kallis and his round-arm action then went on to make it four in four when clean bowling Makhaya Ntini. 

Kemar Roach (2011)

The West Indies were in complete control of their 2011 group-stage contest with the Netherlands and Kemar Roach wrapped up the game in style. 

Right-arm quick Roach took the final three Dutch wickets with three successive balls and completed a victory in no uncertain style. 

Lasith Malinga (2011)

Malinga secured his second World Cup hat-trick against Kenya in 2011.  The Sri Lanka star dismissed Tanmay Mishra, before cleaning up both Peter Ongondo and Shem Ngoche in the following over.

Steven Finn (2015)

Steven Finn is the first and only England bowler to date to take a World Cup hat-trick.

Australia were dominating the group game at the MCG on 342-6 with just three balls remaining, before Finn had Brad Haddin, Glenn Maxwell and Mitchell Johnson all caught from the final three deliveries of the innings. 

Sadly it counted for little by the end of the match as the Baggy Greens swept to a 111-run victory by bowling England out for 231 in the 42nd over.

JP Duminy (2015)

Off-spinner JP Duminy is the last player to have taken a World Cup hat-trick and it will be interesting to see if the achievement is matched at the 2023 staging of the competition.

The South Africa all-rounder saw Sri Lanka’s Angelo Matthews and Nuwan Kulasekara caught and Tharindu Kaushal was then dismissed lbw in a quarter-final match which the Proteas won by nine wickets.