Brazil's Laura Cardoso becomes first player to pick nine wickets in T20Is

Brazil pacer Laura Cardoso created history with a nine-wicket haul against Lesotho, becoming the first-ever cricketer, men’s or women’s, to register the feat.

She returned with exceptional figures of 9 for 4 in three overs, including two maidens and a hat-trick, the best figures recorded in T20I cricket. Cardoso surpassed the record held by Bhutan’s Sonam Yeshey’s 8 for 7 against Myanmar in a Men's T20I in 2025.

Batting first, Brazil notched up a formidable total of 202 on the back of Roberta Avery’s 48 off 35 and Monnike Machado's unbeaten 69 off 41.

The opposition was no match for Brazil as Cardoso ran riot with the ball. Her spell commenced in the second over, in which she picked up a hat-trick. Her next one was a four-wicket over, taking her match tally to seven. She returned to bowl the sixth over of the innings, adding two more scalps to etch her name in the record books with unprecedented nine-fer.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Confederação Brasileira de Cricket (@cricketbrasil)

Cardoso’s exceptional performance meant Lesotho were dismissed for a paltry 13 runs in 6.2 overs, losing the contest by a mammoth margin of 189 runs.

Cardoso also bettered Indonesia's Rohmalia Rohmalia's figures of 7/0 against Mongolia in 2024 in women’s T20Is. Rohmalia was the third bowler to take seven wickets in a women's T20I, following Argentina's Alison Stocks (7 for 3 vs Peru) and the Netherlands' Frederique Overdijk (7 for 3 vs France).

Cardoso, the 21-year-old all-rounder, has played 48 T20Is for Brazil and picked up 55 wickets at an economy of 4.27.

Best bowling figures in women's T20Is