It is the penultimate day of the Big Bash League regular season on Saturday and we have a double header of action which gets underway in Melbourne as the tournament life is on the line for the Melbourne Renegades and the Brisbane Heat.
The equation for these two teams is very simple. If they win they keep their season alive but if they lose then they are done for the campaign and will be watching the remainder of the competition so it is knockout cricket here.
Melbourne Renegades
This clearly hasn’t been a season that has gone to plan for the Melbourne Renegades and they go into the last match needing to win to move into fourth place and then they will be relying on other results to go their way later in the weekend for them to move onto the finals. Unfortunately for them, with the two teams above them in the table meeting in the second part of the Saturday double header a mandatory win won’t be enough for the Renegades, they need as big a win as possible.
The problem with that is that the Renegades batting really hasn’t fired as a unit at all this season. It might be that the do or die nature of the tie brings out the best in that department but it will need to because as well as their bowlers might be able to restrict things it won’t matter if the batting doesn’t come to the party. It will be interesting to see if they move personnel around with the bat too in the chase for quick runs.
Brisbane Heat
The defending champions lost control of their destiny when they couldn’t defend 201 against Hobart Hurricanes earlier in the week. They are not dead and buried but they have to win this last game to move into fourth spot and then they will need to hope that a potentially changed Hobart Hurricanes side can get the better of the Melbourne Stars on Sunday to ensure that they qualify for the finals and have a crack at making a successful defence of the title.
If that is going to happen you would imagine that the Heat bowling will need to step up and be counted. To be fair, Spencer Johnson has been in excellent form throughout the matches he has played in the tournament but he needs help from those around him if the Heat are going to restrict even an out of form batting unit. We are at the stage of the season where the Heat keep having to chop and change because of international commitments which is never easy.
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Key Players
If Melbourne Renegades are going to get the volume of runs that they need in order to boost their net run rate by a decent amount then it might be the former Brisbane Heat player Josh Brown who needs to get going and deliver the goods.
Spencer Johnson could open this match right up for the Brisbane Heat if he can get rid of one or two of the powerful top order batters. His bowling at the end of the innings could be useful too if the Renegades bat first and adopt an everything must go policy.
Betting
The Melbourne Renegades haven’t played particularly well with the bat this season but the time has come where they need to deliver here and the Brisbane Heat bowling unit might be rolling into town at just the right time for them. The Heat have conceded 251 and 207 in their last two matches so if the Renegades wanted an attack to take to the cleaners they might just have landed on the right one should they be good enough to get after it.
Melbourne Renegades have yet to hit more than 144 on this ground this season but they have hit 15 and 17 boundaries in separate innings in that time so the over 17.5 boundaries certainly gets my attention here. Brisbane Heat will have to find another bowling option after the thumb injury that Matt Kuhnemann sustained in the last match which will rule him out of this one. In that match that the Renegades hit 17 boundaries neither Jake Fraser-McGurk or Tim Seifert hit a boundary so there is more to come here and with the table situation we can rest assured the Melbourne will be on the attack so I like the over on this line.
Tips
Back Melbourne Renegades – Over 17.5 boundaries for a 3/10 stake at 1.83 with Bet365
