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Performances that don't fade away: Best hat-tricks in the IPL

Pravin Tambe’s reaction after his hat-trick against Kolkata Knight Riders

In the eight years of the Indian Premier League, the 2015 edition is yet to see a bowler claim a hat-trick in an IPL game. And unless there is some display of brilliance in the final game of the competition, the eighth edition will always be remembered as the year which didn’t see a single bowler taking three wickets off three consecutive deliveries.

However, to make up for the absence of a hat-trick this year, we go down memory lane and relive some of the more extraordinary spells of bowling that bowlers have delivered. From Ashish Nehra to Yuvraj Singh, from Amit Mishra to Sunil Narine, there have been thirteen hat-tricks over seven seasons.

Here is our selection of three hat-tricks that will never fade away from memory.

Pravin Tambe vs Kolkata Knight Riders – Ahmedabad, 2014

Kolkata Knight Riders entered this particular game having lost three on the trot – a number which would return to haunt them later in the game. Batting first, the Rajasthan Royals scored at a brisk pace right throughout their innings on a flattish Motera deck. With 171 to chase, Kolkata got off to a good start, putting up an opening stand of 121 in little under 15 overs. With seventy percent of their target chased down, few would have predicted what happened next.

In the span of two runs and eight deliveries, Kolkata Knight Riders lost six wickets to find themselves reeling at 6 for 123 after 15.2 overs. And the chief architect of that collapse? A portly figure by the name of Pravin Tambe, who, if conventional wisdom applies, should be anywhere but on a cricket field.

Tambe’s romantic IPL fairytale was capped with a magical spell where he picked up three wickets in a hat-trick that crippled the Knight Riders batting. The first wicket was of Manish Pandey, who, after being fed with a couple of dot balls, danced down the track as the wily Tambe pushed it down the leg side for Sanju Samson to complete a stumping off a wide delivery.

The next was Yusuf Pathan, who yorked himself and in the process hit one straight back at Tambe, who took a tumbling return catch. The third wicket though was the most special one, as spectators saw a jubilated 42-year-old running around the field after taking that wicket. Tambe tossed the delivery as Ryan ten Doeschate tried playing it off the front foot. The ball hit the batsman’s toe and he was gone. A shell shocked ten Doeschate stood there, more in disbelief than anything else.

Rajasthan eventually won the game, by a handsome margin of 10 runs, with Tambe being the hero.

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