Sydney Thunder paceman Gurinder Sandhu has snared the third hat-trick of his professional career to restrict the Perth Scorchers to 9-133 in the BBL clash at Metricon Stadium.
In an innings reduced to 18 overs due to an early rain delay in Thursday's match, Sandhu snared 4-22 to put the Thunder in the box seat for victory.
Under the Duckworth-Lewis-Stern method, the Thunder require 135 for victory.
In November, Sandhu became the first Australian to pick up two List-A hat-tricks.
His first came while playing for Tasmania against Victoria in the Marsh Cup final in 2018, and he repeated the heroics while playing for Queensland in a 50-over match against South Australia in November.
The 28-year-old now has a BBL hat-trick to his name after snaring Scorchers trio Colin Munro (18 off 20 balls), Aaron Hardie (4), and Laurie Evans (20) in consecutive deliveries.
Munro was the first to fall on the last ball of the 12th over when he struck Sandhu straight to cover.
Then, as Sandhu returned to the attack in the 16th over, Hardie immediately holed out in the deep, before Evans skied one high for an easy catch.
Ashton Agar (22 off 10 balls), who managed to ensure Sandhu didn't make it four wickets from four balls, proved the only Scorchers player to strike the ball with any real consistency.
Thunder spinner Chris Green (1-9 off two overs) combined brilliantly with Sandhu to keep the Scorchers' run rate down.
The Scorchers (8-1) entered the match on top of the table, with their only loss so far this season coming against the third-placed Thunder (5-3).
