Stats: Moeen Ali's rare hat-trick in numbers

Moeen Ali wrapped up the 3rd Test against South Africa at The Oval with a hat-trick spread over two different overs to end the South African resistance. Just when Dean Elgar and Keshav Maharaj pair seemed to be frustrating the home side, Moeen got rid of the centurion Elgar by setting him up beautifully and then laying the trap on the 5th ball of the 76th over and then dismissed Kagiso Rabada on the very next ball. He completed his hat-trick in the next over by hitting Morne Morkel’s pads in front. Though the umpire ruled it not out at first, England decided to review and that got him the hat-trick.

Here we look at all the stats and recorded Moeen Ali created with his hat-trick.

0 – Out of the 42 hat-tricks recorded in Test cricket before Moeen Ali’s, none of them included three left-handed batsmen.

3 – Number of hat-tricks including Ali’s are the ones that concluded a Test match. G Lohmann’s triple strike England against South Africa at Port Elizabeth in 1896 and H Trumble’s hat-trick for Australia against England at Melbourne in 1902 are the two similar hat-tricks.

3 – Number of hat-tricks in Test cricket decided or confirmed by decision review system including Moeen Ali’s hat-trick. Peter Siddle in 2010 and Rangana Herath in 2016 also recorded their hat-tricks with a DRS decision.

4 – Ali’s hat-trick is only the 4th by an England spinner and overall the 14th hat-trick by 13 England players in Test cricket. W Bates in 1882/83, J Briggs in 1891/92 and Tom Goddard in 1938/39 are the only spinners who picked up hat-tricks for England in Tests before Moeen.

100 – Moeen Ali’s hat-trick was the first ever in Test cricket at The Oval, which was hosting the 100th Test match; the most Tests at any venue before a hat-trick was registered. Nottingham witnessed the first hat-trick in Tests in the 57th match. Wellington and Trinidad have hosted 60 Tests each but are yet to witness a hat-trick.

1957/58 – Moeen Ali’s hat-trick is the first against South Africa since their readmission to cricket. The last bowler to take a Test hat-trick against South Africa was Australia’s Lindsay Kline at Cape Town who did that in 1957-58.

List of Test hat-tricks for England:

(Stats as on July 31, 2017)