There have been a total of 152 hat tricks in international cricket, however, the first one was taken back on January 2, 1879 by Australia’s Fred Spofforth during Day 1 of the only Test against England in Melbourne. Notably, it was just the third Test ever being played in international cricket and Spofforth decided to make it special by etching his name in record books by picking the first-ever hat-trick.

The day began well for England as captain Lord Harris won the toss and elected to bat first. However, after winning the toss things didn’t go down well for the visiting side as Spofforth wreaked havoc on them right from the word go. Opener George Ulyett was the first victim of the right-arm speedster who lost his stumps against him.

Frank Allan also got into the act from the other end by dismissing Alexander Webbe (4) and Bunny Lucas (6) to leave England in all sorts of trouble at 14/4. However, Spofforth got one step ahead of his bowling partner by claiming a hat trick with England having just 26 runs on the board.

The speedster first destroyed the stumps of The Revd Vernon Royle and Francis MacKinnon who was also facing his first ball in international cricket. He later got Tom Emmet caught on the third consecutive ball to achieve the historic feat.

Spofforth finished the innings with figures of 6/48 and bundled out England for 113. He further picked 7/62 in the second innings as Australia won the match by ten wickets. The Sydney-born cricketer played 18 Tests in his career and picked 94 wickets at an average of 18.41 with seven five-wicket hauls and four ten-wicket hauls.

Apart from that, Spofforth scalped 853 wickets in total from 155 First Class games at an average of 14.95 with 84 fifers and 32 ten-wicket hauls to his name.