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Top 20 in 2020: Biggest BBL moments, 8-6

Ahead of the 10th season of the KFC BBL, we continue our countdown of the most memorable moments in the tournament's history

Big sixes, great catches and thrilling finishes - the first nine seasons of the KFC Big Bash League has had all that and much, much more.

Top 20 Biggest BBL Moments: 20-18 | 17-15 | 14-12 | 11-9

To mark the competition's 10th season this summer, we're counting down 20 of the biggest moments from the competition's history, be they good, bad or just downright bizarre.

We continue today with numbers 11 to 9 in the countdown and will continue to re-live some more classic moments over the next five days.

8) Laughlin & Weatherald's stunning double act

Melbourne Renegades v Adelaide Strikers, Melbourne, BBL|08

Image Id: DDC26A0BF7724EAE97A52EDB761B9189

By Louis Cameron

Nearly three years on from the KFC Big Bash League's fielding moment for the ages, Jake Weatherald is still putting on a "a bit of mayo".

"If one of the boys challenges me on how good a fielder I am, I tell them I took the greatest catch of all time," Weatherald says with a big grin.

He is partially right. The humour lies in the fact that although Weatherald did play a role in taking arguably the best catch the league has ever seen, the suggestion he took the best catch the league has ever seen is like Tybalt claiming he was the star of Romeo and Juliet.

The real hero was of course Weatherald’s Adelaide Strikers teammate Ben Laughlin, who had sprinted from long off after Dwayne Bravo sent a trademark lofted cover drive from Rashid Khan’s bowling skywards.

Biggest BBL Moments No.8: Laughlin & Weatherald's double act

Laughlin took the catch above his head at full pace and then, realising he was just a few metres from the boundary rope, back-hand flicked the ball at least 20 metres to Weatherald at deep cover.

Weatherald's ensuing celebrations – the "mayo" – give the whole sequence a video-game like quality.

The descriptions each player gave to cricket.com.au on the night following their comfortable win over the Melbourne Renegades still sum it up the best.

"I just thought I was a bystander at the start … he managed to throw it so much further (than he thought was possible) and I couldn't believe I was in the game," Weatherald said after play.

"I was just cruising around, ready to get around him … I chucked a bit of mayo on at the end with a bit of a dive to get the crowd up and about."

Laughlin added: "I didn't realise I was actually that close (to the boundary) and then 'panic stations', and then just hoped Jakey wasn't drifting at cover … It was a 'Hail Mary'."

Not only did the catch go viral, Laughlin and Weatherald's explanation of their masterpiece also garnered attention abroad.

US magazine Golf Digest ran an online piece headlined, "The only thing better than this Aussie cricket catch is the indecipherable post-match interview,"complete with a Crocodile Dundee reference in the copy.

"Technically this is the same language we speak here in the States, but in practice, it's a mad lib," Coleman Bentley wrote.

Weatherald of course acknowledges it was Laughlin who had done the hard yards, with the effort topping a long list of impressive fielding efforts from the league's all-time leading wicket taker.

Image Id: 8459CDB4CC77481897CCDFD6FE230C1B Image Caption: The Strikers celebrate a remarkable catch // Getty

But don't expect Weatherald to pull out the "Champion" celebration (made famous by Bravo himself after West Indies' 2016 World T20 victory) or anything quite like it again.

"There are no regrets, but I don't really celebrate (like that) anymore. I've reigned it in," the South Australian batter told cricket.com.au recently.

"I'm going to have kids one day and I don't want them to see me carrying on like that. After that moment I've calmed down a bit.

"It was pretty cool doing it off two T20 legends – Rashid Khan and Dwayne Bravo – and Benny Laughlin is a T20 legend as well.

"You don't ever think you'll be part of anything like that. Then suddenly you're there and you don't believe you actually did it – even though I did nothing."

7) The leave that stopped the nation

Brisbane Heat v Melbourne Stars, Brisbane, BBL|04

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By Martin Smith

Adam Gilchrist throws his hands above his head, eyes wide and mouth agape, as he looks sheepishly to his right and utters, “I’m stunned. Speechless.”

To his left, Damien Fleming stares blankly straight ahead before his eyes dart down to a television replay, as if searching for confirmation of what he had just witnessed.

If it were a cartoon, their jaws would have hit the floor.

One of the stranger moments in BBL history is best remembered not for the action out in the middle, but the reaction in the commentary box.

Biggest BBL Moments No.7: Maxwell's stunning leave

But the near comical response in the Channel 10 studio at the Gabba in late 2014, which quickly went global, masked an underlying sadness of the moment’s key protagonist, just weeks after cricket’s most heartbreaking tragedy.

Six months after dominating the Indian Premier League like few men before or since, Maxwell started the 2014-15 home summer with his confidence higher than it had ever been, and with a World Cup on home soil looming ever closer at the end of the season.

But the unthinkable passing that November of Phillip Hughes, one of Maxwell’s closest mates in the game, sent the allrounder into a sudden – and perfectly understandable – fog of grief. He began daydreaming on the cricket field, he was angry at people he shouldn’t have been, and he started to doubt himself.

It was against this turbulent backdrop that he walked onto the Gabba that night, advanced at the first ball he faced, shouldered arms, and his world caved in.

Image Id: E53B6FB47D0A44DF896D78BBB162E089 Image Caption: Gilchrist and Fleming were stunned

"I was pretty depressed,” he recalled to cricket.com.au in 2018. “I was flat. I was low.

"I started to really hate the game."

"That was the hardest thing for me to understand – I was at such a high at some stage during 2014 where I felt like I was hitting the ball so well. To get to such a low, where I was charging down the wicket and not playing a shot and getting bowled, it was hard to fathom.

"Mentally I was in a lot of trouble."

Image Id: D7B4D6DC3BE04BFF9E928D6BA8AE8547 Image Caption: Maxwell ended a turbulent summer a World Cup hero // Getty

In many ways, the 12 months following the start of that 2014 IPL tournament were emblematic of Maxwell’s rollercoaster career. Bookended by the high of a breakthrough IPL and a World Cup win that he played an integral part in, he also had to wade through the tragic loss of a close mate, and – following THAT leave – being “called all sorts of things under the sun”, including suggestions that he was match-fixing.

To this day, Maxwell is just like Gilchrist and Fleming and completely lost for words when attempting to explain why he did what he did.

For better or worse, that moment – and the reaction in the commentary box – remains an unforgettable chapter in the competition’s 10-year history.

6) Jordan Silk's Gabba stunner

Brisbane Heat v Sydney Sixers, Brisbane, BBL|03

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By Adam Burnett

Jordan Silk's diving catch in KFC BBL|03 was so damn good, became such a sensation on social media, that the man himself worried in the weeks afterward it was all he was ever going to be known for.

Throw in Ricky Ponting's endorsement at the time of Silk as the country's finest fielder, and the young Sixer – who to that point was barely averaging double-digits in BBL cricket – feared he was going to be very much the one-trick pony.

"I've tried to move past it – I want to be known for my batting," said the then 21-year-old, less than a fortnight after taking what is widely regarded as the greatest of all BBL catches.

"It's nice the amount of support I've been getting, it's obviously a nice feeling, but I've moved past that now."

Biggest BBL Moments No.6: Silk's Gabba stunner

Pleasingly for Silk, he has indeed moved past it, and almost seven years later, he is a reigning KFC BBL champion with the Sixers, for whom he played some clutch innings at the back end of their title charge last summer.

And while he has taken many more catches since – including one that almost rivalled this all-time classic – nothing had the impact of that Superman hanger from BBL|03. So even though Silk has moved past it, we're sure he won't mind us luxuriating in it one more time for the sake of nostalgia.  

The scene: January 2 – the Sixers are at the Gabba for a showdown with the Heat, and having made 8-140, the match is in the balance with the home side 4-97 in the 15th.

The equation reads '44 runs required from 33 balls', but the Heat have an ace up their sleeve, with gun England opener Craig Kieswetter controlling proceedings, having moved to 38 from 39 balls.

Brett Lee steams in and sends one down, perhaps a little full outside off, and the right-handed Kieswetter clears the front leg and sends the ball flying through the vacant mid-on region.

Only, it isn't vacant.

Image Id: 53760F46E15D487590560B7207C0DA2B Image Caption: Silk quickly established himself as one of the BBL's best fielders // Getty

Coming around from a slightly wider position, Silk moves to his left with all the predatory instincts of Australia's most dangerous fielder. One, two, three steps to his left … and then he gets airborne.

Make no mistake – this isn't a fling, or a lunge, or a leap; it is the most spectacular, perfectly-timed, fully horizontal dive the Big Bash has ever seen.

Silk hops up, raises the ball in one hand, points to the Sixers bench, and meets Lee and co for some back slaps. Job done, just like that.

The Sixers go on to win the game, but no-one remembers that part, because in the hours that follow, Silk's catch has officially melted social media.

So we're sorry Jordan, but we still haven't moved past it.

Lucky you can bat, too.

Return to cricket.com.au tomorrow as we continue our countdown of the most memorable moments in BBL history

Top 20 Biggest BBL Moments (so far)

20) BBL makes bloody big impact

19) Bob Quiney and the seagull

18) Dan Christian hits the roof

17) Zampa uses his head to get a wicket

16) Peter Handscomb arrives

15) Lynn hits five sixes in a row

14) Magician Malinga takes six of the best

13) Gayle equals world record for fastest fifty

12) Warne commentates McCullum’s wicket

11) McDermott's miracle under the roof

10) Morgan's last-ball fairytale

9) Warne v Samuels adds fire to the BBL

8) Laughlin & Weatherald's stunning double act

7) The leave that stopped the nation

6) Jordan Silk's Gabba stunner