Former New Zealand and Otago spinner Peter Petherick died in Perth in Western Australia on Sunday. He was 72.
Petherick, who made his test debut when aged 34, was born in Ranfurly and spent a long period in the town.
He was a latecomer to both first-class and test cricket and did not play for Otago until he was 33 as the Alabaster brothers, Jack and Gren, kept him out of the Otago side in the 1960s and the early 1970s.
After making his first-class debut in 1975, Petherick was picked for New Zealand the following year for an arduous tour of Pakistan and India.
With Hedley Howarth unavailable, Petherick was picked to make his test debut in the first test against Pakistan in Lahore.
Pakistan batted first and Javed Miandad and Asif Iqbal notched big centuries.
Petherick, though, got the breakthrough when he had Miandad caught by Richard Hadlee.
Wasim Raja was next man in and the first ball he faced he hit low and hard back to Petherick, who caught the ball.
With Raja back in the pavilion, Intikhab Alam came out to bat and was surrounded by eight fielders.
He played forward to the ball which hit his glove and Geoff Howarth dived to his left to hold the catch, and allow Petherick to make history.
Petherick was just the second player to take a hat trick on debut, after Englishman Maurice Allom. Australian Damien Fleming has since achieved the feat.
James Franklin became the second New Zealander to take a test hat trick, against Bangladesh in 2004.
New Zealand ended up losing the match in which Petherick took his hat trick and by, the end of the 1976-77 season, he had played the final of his six tests. He took 16 wickets in those tests, only one of which was played at home.
He continued playing for Otago until 1981 and picked up 189 first-class wickets, including a bag of nine wickets in an innings.
An obituary will follow.
