Shipley stars with hat-trick

A hat-trick among half-a-dozen scalps for Henry Shipley propelled Canterbury to a thumping Ford Trophy win over Wellington yesterday.

The right-arm seamer ploughed through the Firebirds’ batting lineup as the hosts were dismissed for 165 in 28.1 overs in reply to Canterbury’s 267-8 at the Basin Reserve in the opening match of the 2022-23 men’s one-day competition.

It was the fourth hat-trick in 52 years of the competition and the first for Canterbury.

The 26-year-old entered the game with an unflattering domestic one-day bowling average of 57.32, but made inroads into making his numbers look a lot better by taking 6-40 from his eight overs.

Bowling first-change, Shipley made the initial breakthrough in Wellington’s chase by removing opener Rachin Ravindra and also picked up Troy Johnson’s wicket.

Soon after, he dismissed Tim Robinson, Lauchie Johns and Luke Georgeson in consecutive balls. He got a delivery to cut back and crash into Robinson’s stumps, had Johns trapped lbw and then produced a fine delivery to catch the edge of left-hander Georgeson’s bat, with wicketkeeper Tom Latham taking the catch to spark celebrations.