South African captain Dane van Niekerk broke the world record for most wickets in an innings in international cricket without conceding a run in the Women’s World Cup 2017 match against West Indies at Grace Road, Leicester. In the process, the leg-spinner also broke a record that was set in 1959 by Australian legend Richie Benaud against India in a Test match in Delhi.
The 24-year-old leggie finished with figures of 3.2-3-0-4 and in the process became the first bowler in the history of cricket to pick up a four-wicket haul without conceding a run in any form of cricket across any format. Her four-wicket haul coupled with a Marizanne Kapp’s four-fer helped South Africa bundle the Windies women for just 48 and win by 10 wickets and with 262 balls to spare, which is the third-biggest win in women’s ODIs in terms of balls.
In the history of cricket (both men’s and women’s), a bowler has picked up a wicket without conceding a single run on 66 occasions. It has happened 62 times in men’s cricket and just four times in women’s cricket. Although a vast majority of the occasions have been when the bowler has bowled just a few balls and picked up the final wicket of the innings.
A testament to this is the fact that several prominent batsmen including the likes of Viv Richards, Ricky Ponting, Joe Root and Inzamam-ul-Haq feature on this list. However, in men's cricket across all formats, 24 times a bowler has bowled at least two overs and still picked up a wicket without conceding a run.
In women’s cricket, Dane van Niekerk’s feat was the fourth time that it had happened and all four occasions saw the bowler in question complete at least two overs and still end up not conceding a run. Coincidentally, all of those occasions have happened in women’s ODIs and never in Tests or T20Is.
Another quirky coincidence is the fact all three previous occasions featured Ireland. New Zealand’s Debbie Hockley finished with figures of 0/1 in 6 overs in 1988 and England’s Gill Smith picked up 0/2 in 5 overs in 1990 and both of them came against Ireland. The only other time before van Niekerk’s superhuman effort was when Ireland's Lara Molins finished with figures of 0/1 in 5 overs against Scotland in 2001.
Although a bowler has picked up a wicket without conceding a run on 66 occasions, this was only the fifth time a bowler had picked up more than one wicket and still failed to concede a run in the innings and the first South African to do so.
Here is the complete list of bowlers who have taken more than one wicket without conceding a run in an innings in international cricket:
| No. | Player | Opposition | Figures | Format | Year |
| 1 | Dane van Niekerk (SA) | West Indies | 3.2-3-0-4 | WODI | 2017 |
| 2 | Richie Benaud (AUS) | India | 3.4-3-0-3 | Test | 1959 |
| 3 | Gill Smith (ENG) | Ireland | 5-5-0-2 | WODI | 1990 |
| 4 | Andy Bichel (AUS) | Namibia | 1-1-0-2 | ODI | 2003 |
| 5 | Mitchell Santner (NZ) | Australia | 0.2-0-0-2 | ODI | 2016 |
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