Ask most cricket fans what MLC is known for, and they’ll say batting. Big totals. Short straight boundaries.
Players like Nicholas Pooran and Quinton de Kock are teeing off under floodlights in Texas or New York.
That framing isn’t wrong. But it ignores something equally compelling: the handful of bowlers who have completely shut down MLC lineups in a single innings — figures so good they’d turn heads in any T20 league on earth.
Best Bowling Figures in an Innings in MLC
This is the complete ranked list of the best bowling figures in an innings in MLC, updated through 2025. Every entry has full stats. Every entry has context.
How Bowling Figures Work in MLC?
Each bowling performance is measured by overs delivered, runs conceded, and wickets taken.
In T20 cricket, four wickets in an innings is considered an outstanding return.
Five wickets are rare. The only six-wicket haul in MLC history has stood since July 2023 and shows no sign of being matched.
Across three completed seasons, MLC has produced four five-wicket-or-better hauls and six four-wicket performances worth ranking. Here are all ten.
Top 10 Best Bowling Figures in an Innings in MLC — All Time
| Rank | Player | Ovrs | Mdns | Runs | Wkts | Econ | Team | Opposition | Ground | Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | SN Netravalkar | 3.5 | 0 | 9 | 6 | 2.34 | Washington | v SF | Morrisville | 22 Jul 2023 |
| 2 | MJ Owen | 3.0 | 0 | 17 | 5 | 5.66 | Washington | v SF | Dallas | 28 Jun 2025 |
| 3 | WD Parnell | 4.0 | 0 | 20 | 5 | 5.00 | Seattle | v Texas | Morrisville | 21 Jul 2023 |
| 4 | AF Milne | 3.4 | 1 | 23 | 5 | 6.27 | Texas | v Seattle | Lauderhill | 5 Jul 2025 |
| 5 | Mohammad Mohsin | 3.0 | 0 | 8 | 4 | 2.66 | Texas | v Los Angeles | Dallas | 13 Jul 2023 |
| 6 | R Ravindra | 2.4 | 1 | 11 | 4 | 4.12 | Washington | v SF | Dallas | 25 Jul 2024 |
| 7 | Mohammad Mohsin | 3.5 | 0 | 13 | 4 | 3.39 | Texas | v SF | Morrisville | 10 Jul 2024 |
| 8 | R Ravindra | 3.5 | 0 | 16 | 4 | 4.17 | Washington | v Texas | Dallas | 19 Jul 2024 |
| 9 | TA Boult | 4.0 | 0 | 17 | 4 | 4.25 | MI New York | v Los Angeles | Lauderhill | 3 Jul 2025 |
| 10 | IG Holland | 4.0 | 0 | 19 | 4 | 4.75 | Washington | v Seattle | Oakland | 14 Jun 2025 |
Washington Freedom accounts for five of these ten entries. Texas Super Kings contribute three.
Seattle Orcas and MI New York each appear once. Pace bowling dominates — eight seamers against two spinners.
Full Spell-by-Spell Analysis
1. Saurabh Netravalkar — 6/9 | Washington vs San Francisco | Morrisville | 22 Jul 2023
The number alone tells the story: nine runs, six wickets, 3.5 overs.
There is no comparable performance in MLC history, and very few that rival it across world T20 cricket in the modern era.
Netravalkar systematically dismantled the San Francisco Unicorns lineup with left-arm swing, removing Marcus Stoinis, Shadab Khan, and Matthew Wade across his opening spells before returning in the final over to complete a collapse that left them all out for 103 chasing 134.
At no point did the innings look like recovering.
The man behind the figures is a full-time software engineer at Oracle who represents the USA in international cricket.
That dual identity became globally recognised when he defended 18 off the final over against Pakistan at the 2024 T20 World Cup — but those who had watched MLC already knew what he was capable of.
| Overs | Mdns | Runs | Wickets | Economy | Result |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3.5 | 0 | 9 | 6 | 2.34 | Washington won by 30 runs |
2. Mitchell Owen — 5/17 | Washington vs San Francisco | Dallas | 28 Jun 2025
Owen’s spell is the most surprising entry on this list, and arguably the most important in terms of what it says about MLC’s talent pool.
He is, first and foremost, a batter — aggressive, powerful, and one of the top run-scorers in MLC 2025.
His 5/17 against San Francisco arrived when the Unicorns were positioned at 97/2, looking comfortable in their chase.
Owen used pace variation and in-swing to dismantle the middle and lower order, restricting them to 157/9.
Washington won comfortably. Owen was Player of the Match for both disciplines in the same game.
| Overs | Mdns | Runs | Wickets | Economy | Result |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3.0 | 0 | 17 | 5 | 5.66 | Washington won by 12 runs |
3. Wayne Parnell — 5/20 | Seattle vs Texas | Morrisville | 21 Jul 2023
Parnell holds a specific piece of MLC history: the first ever five-wicket haul in the league.
Four days before Netravalkar bettered it, Parnell captain-led Seattle Orcas to a dominant eight-wicket win over Texas Super Kings with a swing-heavy, length-varied opening spell that the TSK batting order had no answer to.
With over 300 T20 appearances for various franchises and national sides, he was exactly the type of experienced international MLC needed in Year One.
His spell did more than win a match — it set the standard for what MLC bowling excellence could look like.
| Overs | Mdns | Runs | Wickets | Economy | Result |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 4.0 | 0 | 20 | 5 | 5.00 | Seattle won by 8 wickets |
4. Adam Milne — 5/23 | Texas vs Seattle | Lauderhill | 5 Jul 2025
Milne’s 2025 MLC season was built for this kind of entry.
Fourteen wickets across five innings at an average of 8.5 — numbers that belong in a different format, not T20 cricket on flat American surfaces.
His 5/23 against Seattle in Lauderhill was the performance that anchored that run.
Texas won the game by 51 runs and took the top of the 2025 table. The New Zealand quick needed no surface assistance.
He created pace and bounce where neither was naturally available, and the Seattle batting order buckled.
| Overs | Mdns | Runs | Wickets | Economy | Result |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3.4 | 1 | 23 | 5 | 6.27 | Texas won by 51 runs |
5. Mohammad Mohsin — 4/8 | Texas vs Los Angeles | Dallas | 13 Jul 2023
The wickets Mohsin took in this spell were not soft ones. Sunil Narine — one of T20 cricket’s most destructive batting options — went.
Adam Zampa, deployed in a lower-order role, went.
Lockie Ferguson, who bats last but is still a wicket the opposition wanted, went. All for eight runs across three overs.
This was Mohsin’s MLC debut season. He was a domestic pick from the Dallas Premier League with no international profile.
He now holds the Texas Super Kings’ all-time wicket record in the competition.
| Overs | Mdns | Runs | Wickets | Economy | Result |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3.0 | 0 | 8 | 4 | 2.66 | Texas won by 69 runs |
6. Rachin Ravindra — 4/11 | Washington vs San Francisco | Dallas | 25 Jul 2024
Left-arm spin in a T20 knockout match is an unusual choice to anchor a bowling attack — but Ravindra’s 4/11 in the MLC 2024 Qualifier made Washington’s captain look very smart for giving him the ball early.
He dismissed Sanjay Krishnamurthi before the Unicorns’ chase had found momentum and kept applying pressure until the innings caved.
A 6.08 bowling average across twelve wickets in MLC 2024 is a number most seam bowlers would be satisfied with. Ravindra produced it as a spinner on batters’ pitches.
| Overs | Mdns | Runs | Wickets | Economy | Result |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2.4 | 1 | 11 | 4 | 4.12 | Washington won by 7 wickets |
7. Mohammad Mohsin — 4/13 | Texas vs San Francisco | Morrisville | 10 Jul 2024
Mohsin’s return to the top-10 list in 2024 — against a different opponent, in a different season, with visibly improved craft — confirmed his standing as one of MLC’s most consistent bowling threats.
He became the first bowler in the league’s history to take multiple four-wicket hauls, and did it with an economy of 3.39 that matched the standard of his debut spell.
| Overs | Runs | Wickets | Economy |
|---|---|---|---|
| 3.5 | 13 | 4 | 3.39 |
8. Rachin Ravindra — 4/16 | Washington vs Texas | Dallas | 19 Jul 2024
Two four-wicket hauls from a specialist batter in a single T20 tournament is a statistical anomaly.
Ravindra delivered both in Washington’s knockout campaign — this second one came in the semi-final against Texas, just one match before the title was won.
Seven of his twelve tournament wickets arrived in the knockout phase, which shows either exceptional big-game temperament or exceptional match-reading, probably both.
| Overs | Runs | Wickets | Economy |
|---|---|---|---|
| 3.5 | 16 | 4 | 4.17 |
9. Trent Boult — 4/17 | MI New York vs Los Angeles | Lauderhill | 3 Jul 2025
Boult has been dismantling T20 batting orders with left-arm swing for over a decade, and his 2025 MLC spell was a precise, unhurried execution of everything he does well.
A golden duck from ball one. Andre Russell was gone before he could turn the innings.
Andre Fletcher was removed before the powerplay ended. The LA Knight Riders’ top three: gone.
He came back a second time to remove Sherfane Rutherford and wrap up any remaining resistance.
MI New York won by eight wickets. Boult had been reintegrated into the MI global franchise network for IPL 2025 and carried that sharpness directly into MLC.
| Overs | Mdns | Runs | Wickets | Economy | Result |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 4.0 | 0 | 17 | 4 | 4.25 | MI New York won by 8 wickets |
10. Ian Holland — 4/19 | Washington vs Seattle | Oakland | 14 Jun 2025
Seattle were 66/1 after the powerplay and looked on course for a competitive total.
Holland’s intervention — two wickets in the 14th over, a third to remove Cameron Gannon — reduced them to 145/9 and shifted complete control to Washington, who won by five wickets.
Holland is the kind of cricketer MLC was specifically designed to give a platform: a USA-based domestic seamer with the skill to compete alongside international names when conditions suit.
His leg cutter in this spell did not merely dismiss batters. It deceived them.
| Overs | Mdns | Runs | Wickets | Economy | Result |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 4.0 | 0 | 19 | 4 | 4.75 | Washington won by 5 wickets |
Team-Wise Breakdown
| Team | Entries in Top 10 | Best Spell |
|---|---|---|
| Washington Freedom | 5 | 6/9 — Netravalkar |
| Texas Super Kings | 3 | 5/23 — Milne |
| Seattle Orcas | 1 | 5/20 — Parnell |
| MI New York | 1 | 4/17 — Boult |
Season-Wise Distribution
| Season | Spells in Top 10 | Top Spell |
|---|---|---|
| MLC 2023 | 4 | 6/9 — Netravalkar |
| MLC 2024 | 3 | 4/11 — Ravindra |
| MLC 2025 | 3 | 5/17 — Owen |
Bowling Style Breakdown
Pace accounts for eight of the ten spells.
MLC surfaces — consistently flat and true across Morrisville, Dallas, Lauderhill, and Oakland — do not offer natural assistance to spin bowlers.
That Ravindra and Mohsin both appear twice as spinners suggests their wickets came through skill and variation rather than surface conditions.
Both bowled predominantly in Dallas, which appears to be MLC’s most spin-friendly venue.
What These Spells Have in Common?
Three things connect the best bowling performances in MLC innings across all three seasons.
First, most were bowled in matches that were already close.
None of the top-ten spells happened in a blowout where the bowling team was already 80 runs ahead — each one created the advantage rather than extended it.
Second, the economy mattered as much as wickets. Five of the ten spells were bowled at under 5.00 runs per over.
In a format where 8–9 per over is routine, restricting runs alongside taking wickets is the dual pressure that breaks chases beyond repair.
Third, seven of the ten were match-winning spells. The bowler’s team won.
Taking wickets in T20 cricket isn’t just a statistical achievement — it changes results.
FAQs: Best Bowling Figures in an Innings in MLC
- What are the best bowling figures ever recorded in a single MLC innings?
Saurabh Netravalkar’s 6/9 for Washington Freedom against San Francisco Unicorns on July 22, 2023 — the only six-wicket haul in MLC history.
- Who are the MLC top wicket-takers all time?
Mohammad Mohsin leads the Texas Super Kings’ all-time wicket tally in MLC. Rachin Ravindra and Saurabh Netravalkar are among Washington Freedom’s most prolific performers.
- Has any batter also taken four wickets in MLC?
Yes — Mitchell Owen, primarily a top-order batter for Washington Freedom, took 5/17 against San Francisco in June 2025.
- What is the best economy rate in a top-10 MLC bowling spell?
Netravalkar’s 2.34 in his record 6/9 spell, followed by Mohammad Mohsin’s 2.66 in his 4/8 performance in MLC 2023.
- Which ground has hosted the most elite bowling spells in MLC?
Dallas and Morrisville share the record with three top-10 spells each.
- Are any of the best bowling figures in MLC from spinners?
Two — both from Rachin Ravindra, who took 4/11 and 4/16 in the MLC 2024 knockout rounds.
Conclusion:
The best bowling figures in an innings in MLC are a record of moments when individual brilliance overrode the conditions, the format, and the batting talent MLC has spent three seasons assembling.
Netravalkar’s 6/9 sits at the top and, given how rarely a six-wicket haul occurs in any T20 league anywhere, it could sit there for a long time.
The list will grow. MLC is three seasons old. Come back after 2026 to see what moves.
Stay Updated
This list is updated at the end of each MLC season. If MLC 2025 produces a new five-wicket haul before the final, this page will reflect it. Bookmark it and check back.
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