Vinay Kumar and the other players who took multiple hat-tricks in Ranji Trophy

A few days ago, we saw Vinay Kumar’s second Ranji Trophy hat-trick skittle out the 41-time champs, Mumbai for a meagre 173 in the Ranji Trophy quarter-final clash at Nagpur. Nothing went right for Mumbai after the toss, as Vinay Kumar led from the front with a hat-trick.

He started by dismissing Mumbai’s wonder kid Prithvi Shaw at the end of the first over. Vinay’s second over started with Jay Bista edging to Karun Nair and Akhil Parkar misinterpreting a yorker, thus making Kumar the first captain with a hat-trick in Ranji knockouts.

He is only the fourth bowler to take multiple hat-tricks in the history of the 73-year-old Ranji Trophy.

Let’s have a look at the other three players who have taken multiple hat-tricks in India’s premier first-class competition.

Anil Kumble

This stalwart of Indian cricket doesn’t need an introduction. Having finished as India’s leading wicket taker in both Tests and ODIs and having taken 10 wickets in a single innings of a Test, there is no surprise he is on this list.

He was the only Karnataka bowler before Vinay Kumar to have claimed two Ranji Trophy hat-tricks. The first of them was at the Visakhapatnam Steel Plant Stadium in 1991.

After Kumble won the toss and put his team to bat, he scored 64 and had a huge partnership with Kartik Jeshwant, who scored 153 to propel Karnataka to an imposing 461.

Andhra tried to make a contest of this, and were 106/2 at one stage. Then came the champion leg spinner Kumble, who rattled Andhra’s middle and lower order, bowling them out for a cheap 140. During the course of this wicket-frenzy, Kumble took his first hat-trick. Andhra’s middle order went through another familiar collapse in the second innings, as they lost the game by an innings and 74 runs.

Kumble, 22 years old at the time, had played just one Test for India, taking three wickets at Manchester in 1990, following which he was out of the team for nearly two years.

Five years later, he unveiled his nerves of steel, in India’s other steel city, Rourkela, taking his second first-class hat-trick.

A more mature Kumble finished with a ten wicket haul inclusive of a hat-trick, as the Odisha side were at the receiving end of an innings and 123 runs hammering. He was instrumental in that season as Karnataka went on to win their fourth Ranji Trophy, beating Uttar Pradesh in the final.

Pritam Gandhe

Despite being the holder of 340 wickets in a career spanning over 21 years for Vidarbha, and taking two of Vidarbha’s three hat-tricks (the other being Umesh Yadav), this wily off-break bowler is still an unknown name in comparison with the others on this list.

Nagpur, where Gandhe is a native of, may b reputed for spin bowling surfaces today, but at that time was lacking the necessary infrastructure. Thus he traveled all the way to Mumbai, just to fulfill his cricketing aspirations.

After earning his maiden Vidarbha call-up in 1987, he went on to become the first from Vidarbha to play 100 first-class matches. Yet he is unlucky in terms of eer gaining an India cap.

The highest he could play is for Air-India and just a couple of matches for India-A.

He was praised by Narendra Hirwani, his Air-India team mate "Forget the wickets, his action was a beauty. He had everything right as an offspinner: the run-up, the head position, the arm coming down, the follow-through."

In 2006, a local journalist introduced Gandhe to Anil Kumble at Nagpur during England’s tour of India, describing him to Kumble as “the man who was unlucky to have missed out the India cap”.

The strange thing about his hat-tricks is that they were separated by what seems like a generation gap, at around 15 years. His first-hat-trick was in 1993 against Rajasthan, in the first ever first-class match at Alwar. He attained a hat-trick despite going wicketless for over 100 runs in his previous Ranji Trophy match against Uttar Pradesh.

Even in this hat-trick match, after Vidarbha was put to bowl first, he had modest returns of 25-6-66-1. In the next innings, despite a century opening stand between the Vidharbha’s wicket-keeper KSM Iyer and Umakant Phate, they found themselves holed out at 261, falling short of a first innings lead by just three runs.

Rajasthan took this tender lead to an 83 run lead before a wicket finally fell. Then the hero Pritam Gandhe entered the stage, taking eight wickets with the Rajasthan side toppling like dominoes, bowled out for 208. During his spell, he didn’t need the services of a fielder to complete his first hat-trick, as he dismissed Gagan Khoda and Pravin Amre bowled before trapping Sanjiv Mudkavi for LBW.

His second hat-trick in 2008 came against the Services at Palam A Ground at 2008 in Delhi. This time he dismissed two batsmen LBW and one caught behind, as he had five of his six hat-trick victims without anyone’s aid.

Debuting in 1987, he retired only nine years ago in 2008, at the age of 38. He often says that playing well for the team is the reason for which he got to play so many matches.

After retirement, he served in the BCCI’s Junior Selection Committee from 2011 to 2015.

Joginder Rao

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Born in 1938, this medium pacer from Haryana finds his name recurrent in statistics pertaining to domestic cricket, by virtue of his love for hat-tricks. This man started his first-class career with a bang, claiming three hat-tricks in his first two matches. But sadly, he played only three more.

At the age of 25, already working for the Indian Army, he was handed his first-class debut for Services against Jammu & Kashmir at the Army Headquarters in Delhi. He instantly repaid his captain's faith in him, as he got rid of the opposing captain Tahir Firdausi, the wicketkeeper Vijay Malhotra and a promising cricketer Abdur Rauf, thus claiming a hat-trick in the first session of his debut Test.

With this, Joginder became only the second bowler to take a hat-trick on first-class debut, after the Pune-based pacer Vasant Ranjane. One can however doubt the mettle in the opposition, as Jammu & Kashmir were playing in only their fifth year in the Ranji Trophy, without having registered a single win and having just one draw to boast of in over 20 matches by then.

Nevertheless, Joginder had a terrific debut, finishing with figures of 26-12-35-8, as the men on the frontiers thrashed the borderline Indian state by an innings and 68 runs.

The Services then headed northwest to play Northern Punjab at the Gandhi Sports Complex Ground in Amritsar. Northern Punjab, a similarly weak team, made its Ranji debut in 1960, just a year later than Jammu and Kashmir. They had won only two matches by this time, and both were against Jammu & Kashmir.

The latest kid on the block, Joginder continued to show his ruthlessness against fragile teams. In the first innings, he couldn’t manage a wicket despite Services bowling out Northern Punjab for a mere 108.

However, he made a strong comeback in the second innings with a brilliant seven wicket haul. Taking a 7-for is big enough, but the manner in which he produced those figures was truly remarkable, as Joginder took two hat-tricks in one innings.

This feat has been achieved by only one other player, Albert Trott. Joginder remains the only player in the history of first class cricket to take three hat-tricks in his first two first-class matches.

Unfortunately, for all the hype surrounding him, he was able to take just six wickets in the next three matches as Services lost their quarter-final spot to Delhi.

A Major General in the Indian National Army, he fought in the Indo-Pak wars of 1965 and 1971.

Sadly, an accident during a parachute training event led to the premature end of his cricketing career. But with the typical determination of a soldier, he never gave up playing sports, and even earned a maiden India call-up in golf. He later redesigned the Army Golf Course at Delhi as well as the Dehra Dun Golf Course.

He passed away in 1994.