Game two of the Saturday night BBL double header sees the Heat hosting the Hurricanes. Can a depleted Heat side take it up to an out of form Hurricanes outfit that's missing some of their star players? As always, we’ve got you covered with our tips below!
BBL11 Heat vs Hurricanes Betting Tips
Gabba, Saturday January 8th, 8.05pm (AEDT)
Brisbane Heat
Likely XI: Jake Lehmann, Jack Clayton, Bryce Street, Sam Heazlett, Tom Cooper, Lachlan Pfeffer, Steven McGiffin, Will Prestwidge, Ronan McDonald, David Grant, Mujeeb Ur Rahman
The Heat will be forced into at least one change, and it's a massive one as Fakhar Azam will miss the game due to Queensland border restrictions. Bryce Street looks likely to be his replacement given his first class experience.
The Heat lost to the Renegades by 5 wickets on Thursday, and the failures of their established batsmen gave them no hope. Pakistani import Fakhar Zaman (3 off 8), Sam Heazlett (12 off 14) and Tom Cooper (4 off 7) all missed out on Thursday, and need to contribute if the Heat are to have any chance of posting a competitive score. Without Fakhar, there's a mountain of pressure on Heazlett and Cooper to produce.
The inexperience in the Heat attack allowed the Renegades to sit on Mujeeb (1/16) while they attacked the other bowlers, with five of the Heat’s seven bowlers conceding above ten runs per over. Harry Grant (3/20) was the only bowler outside of Mujeeb that had any impact with the ball.
Hobart Hurricanes
Likely XI: Ben McDermott, D'Arcy Short, Caleb Jewell, Peter Handscomb, Tim David, Mac Wright, Tom Lammonby, Mitch Owen, Tom Rogers, Riley Meredith, Sandeep Lamichhane
It hasn’t been smooth sailing from a selection standpoint for the Hurricanes, with injuries and Covid protocols taking a toll. Captain Matthew Wade is unavailable due to personal reasons, Nathan Ellis and Joel Paris are out through injury, - and to top it off Josh Kann, Harry Brook and Jordan Thompson are unavailable due to Covid protocols.
After a promising start to the season, the Hurricanes have hit a form slump with shock losses to the Heat and Strikers in their last two games. The consecutive losses has seen the Hurricanes drop to fourth place on the table and they’ve fallen right back in the chasing pack, only four points ahead of the seventh placed Strikers.
Despite the absences the Canes still boast a batting line-up that features McDermott, Short, Handscomb and David. There’s enough talent that should put up a big score on a batting friendly surface at the Gabba. Expect a fired up Hurricanes side ready to make amends for their last two showings.
Match Predicition
The Hurricanes would’ve fancied themselves against a full strength Brisbane Heat side, and even more so given the outs they’ve now got. As we’ve seen on a few occasions so far in the last week, the gap in talent is simply too much to make up with replacement players.
The Hurricanes will have the luxury of being able to play risk free cricket against Mujeeb, whilst targeting the less experienced bowlers in the attack. There’s going to be plenty of runs on offer for the Hurricanes, and a golden opportunity for D’Arcy Short to find some form in this clash - which the Hurricanes need desperately.
There’s not much value in the H2H market, so couple it with the Hurricanes to score above 145. We'll add that when those odds are available on Sportsbet.
Hurricanes H2H + 145 Runs
$1.75
Same Game Multi
There’s a heavy Hurricanes flavour to our SGM given the state of the Heat squad, and we’re kicking off with Ben McDermott to score 20+ runs. McDermott is the leading run scorer in BBL11 with 364 runs at an average of 60, and our BBL Data Tools show us that he’s passed 20 in 53% of his innings since BBL07.
For our second leg we’re taking D’Arcy Short to score 10+ runs. Despite posting a career worst strike rate, Short hasn’t had issues getting to double figures - he’s passed 10 in eight of his nine matches this season.
To finish off, we’re sticking with the first mode of dismissal being caught, which has occurred in eight of the nine games the Brisbane Heat have played this season.
McDermott 20+ Runs
Short 10+ Runs
1st Wicket - Caught
HEA vs HUR Same Game Multi
$3.10
